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Chicken Fricassee

A stew of chicken simmered with vegetables and a roux-based sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and carrot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Chicken Fricassee

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken

  1. Dress and clean the chicken.

  2. Cut the chicken into serving pieces.

  3. Season the chicken with salt, pepper, and ginger.

  4. Let it stand for several hours or overnight.

Simmer

  1. Cover the chicken with boiling water.

  2. Simmer for 3 hours.

  3. Add the diced vegetables.

  4. Cook until tender.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. In a frying pan, melt the fat or butter.

  2. Add the flour.

  3. Gradually pour in the chicken stock, stirring to prevent lumps.

  4. Season the sauce to taste.

  5. Pour it over the chicken.

  6. Let it cook for a few minutes.

  7. Serve with biscuits or dumplings.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Celery + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Carrot + gingertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Provides the main protein and body of the dish, becoming tender as it simmers.
Flour
Thickens the sauce when cooked in melted fat before the stock is added.
Chicken fat or butter
Carries the flour for the roux and adds richness to the sauce.
Chicken stock
Forms the liquid base of the sauce, adding savory flavor.
Onion, celery, and carrot
Add aromatic sweetness and flavor to the cooked dish.

The step that matters

Stirring the stock into the flour. Adding stock gradually while stirring keeps the starch dispersed so the sauce thickens smoothly instead of forming lumps.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, celery, carrot, flour, pepper, ginger):

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Turnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, celery, carrot, flour, pepper, ginger. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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