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Southern Chicken

A hearty chicken soup with tomatoes, beans, corn, potatoes, noodles, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Lima beans and corn work together. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 222 recipes. Both carry 2,3-pentanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Southern Chicken

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the chicken into small pieces.

  2. Boil water in a large kettle for three minutes.

Cook the soup

  1. Add onions, beans, corn, potatoes, chicken, and spices.

  2. Cover tightly and cook slowly for 2.5 hours, stirring frequently.

  3. Add tomatoes, sugar, and celery; cook for another 30 to 45 minutes.

  4. Fifteen minutes before serving, add milk and noodles.

Serve

  1. Serve thick in large soup dishes or plates.

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. Lima beans + corntop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together222 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Tomato + corntop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,099 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 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

Lima beans
Hold their shape and add body and starch that thickens the broth as they cook.
Potatoes
Release starch as they cook, thickening the broth and giving the soup a hearty texture.
Tomatoes
Add acidity and a bright flavor that balances the richness of the chicken and broth.
Milk
Adds richness and creaminess to the broth when stirred in near the end.
Noodles
Absorb liquid and add soft, starchy body to the soup.

The step that matters

Cover tightly and cook slowly for 2.5 hours. A gentle, covered simmer lets the chicken and beans become tender without breaking down into mush, and keeps the broth from reducing too fast. Stirring frequently helps prevent the starchy potatoes and beans from scorching on the bottom of the pot.

Swap the lima beans

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, tomato, corn, celery, milk, sugar, pepper):

  1. Beansfits better
  2. Chickpeafits about as well
  3. Peanutfits about as well
  4. Lima beansthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, tomato, corn, celery, milk, sugar, pepper. 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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