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Chicken Pie

A savory pie with chicken, pork, and gravy, topped with butter and crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Chicken and pork match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,417 recipes. Both carry 2-furfurylthiol, which smells coffee, roasted. The science ↓

Chicken Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the filling

  1. Stew the chicken in water for 30 minutes if it is young, well covered.

  2. Season the stew with pepper and coarse sea salt.

  3. Thicken the gravy with flour mixed with milk or water.

Assemble the pie

  1. Line a deep pan with a moderately thin pie crust.

  2. Place a cup upside down in the dish before adding the chicken to prevent gravy from escaping.

  3. Place the poorer parts of the chicken at the bottom of the pan.

  4. Place the better parts on top of the poorer parts.

  5. Pour the gravy over the chicken.

  6. Add bits of butter.

  7. Add the upper crust.

  8. Press the crust firmly to seal.

  9. Cut openings for steam.

Bake

  1. Bake for 1 hour at 350°F (175°C).

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 + porktop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,417 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Pork + milktop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,386 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  5. Chicken + milktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,389 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).

Flour and butter 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 meat, with the poorer and better parts layered for different textures.
Flour
Thickens the gravy so it coats the chicken and holds together in the pie.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that melts into the filling and moistens the dish.
Pie crust
Forms the lining and top that encloses the filling and browns in the oven.

The step that matters

Thicken the gravy before assembling. Flour must be mixed with milk or water and cooked into the stew so it thickens fully; flour added raw or unmixed can clump and leave the gravy thin or lumpy, which runs out of the pie.

“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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