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Jellied Chicken

A chilled chicken dish set in gelatin with celery, onion, parsley, and egg garnish.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,810 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Jellied Chicken

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the chicken

  1. Stew the chicken in cold water with the onion, celery, and half of the parsley until very tender.

  2. Bring to a boil slowly and cook until the meat slips from the bones.

  3. Remove the meat from the stock and cut it into pieces.

Make the jelly

  1. Strain 2 cups of the stock and add the soaked gelatine.

  2. Season the mixture with salt and white pepper.

Set and serve

  1. Arrange the chicken pieces in the bottom of a brick-shaped pan.

  2. Pour in the gravy and part of the jelly stock, then add more chicken, alternating until the mold is full.

  3. Set in a cool place until firm.

  4. Turn out and serve garnished with the remaining parsley and sliced egg.

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 + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

  2. Celery + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Chicken + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  4. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Parsley + white peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Provides the meat that is set in the jelly and gives the dish its body.
Gelatine
Sets the strained stock into a firm jelly so the dish holds its shape when turned out.
Celery
Adds aromatic flavour to the stock the chicken is cooked in.
Onion
Adds aromatic flavour to the stock the chicken is cooked in.

The step that matters

Set in a cool place until firm. Gelatine sets only when the liquid is cool enough; the jelly needs time and a chilled setting to firm fully, or the dish will not hold its shape when turned out.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, celery, onion, parsley, egg):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Garlicfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, celery, onion, parsley, egg. 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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