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Chicken Spaghetti

Chicken spaghetti is a baked pasta dish with chicken, spaghetti, tomatoes, onions, and cheese.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,377 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Chicken Spaghetti

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken and spaghetti

  1. Boil the chicken until tender, then remove the meat from the bones and chop it finely.

  2. Boil the spaghetti in the chicken broth until the broth is absorbed.

Make the tomato sauce

  1. In a separate pot, boil the tomatoes until very tender, then mash them through a sieve.

  2. Add the chopped onions, celery salt, red pepper, and salt to the mashed tomatoes.

  3. Mix in the chopped chicken, then pour the mixture over the spaghetti and combine well.

Bake and serve

  1. Transfer to a casserole dish, cover with grated cheese, and bake until browned.

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

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

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

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

  3. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

  5. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 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 meaty bulk that the sauce and spaghetti are combined with.
Spaghetti
Forms the body of the dish, soaking up the broth and sauce as it cooks.
Tomatoes
Supply the moisture and acidity that make up the sauce base.
Onions
Add savory sweetness and aroma as they soften into the sauce.
Butter
Adds fat and richness to the finished dish.
Grated cheese
Melts and browns on top during baking, adding savory flavor and a golden crust.

The step that matters

Boiling the spaghetti in the chicken broth until it is absorbed. If the broth is not fully absorbed or the pasta is undercooked, the spaghetti stays firm and dry; if overcooked, it turns mushy and loses its structure when baked.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, tomato, onion, pepper, butter, cheese):

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Celerythe original
  4. Parsleyfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, tomato, onion, pepper, butter, cheese. 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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