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Fricassee of Chicken in a Minute

A quick chicken fricassee made with butter, flour, broth or water, eggs, cream, and mushrooms.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Chicken and mushroom are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,172 recipes. Both carry 1-butyl acetate, which smells fruity, banana. The science ↓

Fricassee of Chicken in a Minute

Ingredients

Directions

Braise the chicken

  1. Melt the butter in a stewpan over medium heat.

  2. Add the chicken pieces.

  3. Season with salt, pepper, and bay leaf.

  4. Add mushrooms.

  5. Stir in the flour until well mixed.

  6. Pour in the broth or water. Stir.

  7. Remove from heat at the first boil.

Finish with the egg sauce

  1. In a bowl, mix the egg yolks with the cream.

  2. Add the mixture to the chicken.

  3. Stir gently over low heat, but do not let it boil to avoid curdling.

  4. Remove the bay leaf before serving.

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. Chicken + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,172 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-butyl acetate (fruity, banana).

  2. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Pepper + mushroomtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,580 recipes

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

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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 meaty body of the dish.
Butter
Adds richness and carries flavor as the chicken begins to cook.
Flour
Thickens the cooking liquid into a smooth sauce.
Eggs
Yolks enrich and thicken the sauce, giving it a silky texture.
Cream
Adds richness and moisture, softening the sauce's flavor and texture.

The step that matters

Adding the egg and cream mixture. Egg yolks thicken through gentle heat, but if the sauce boils they can scramble and curdle. Stirring over low heat keeps the sauce smooth and silky.

“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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