Pressed Chicken
Ingredients
Directions
Cook the chicken
Place the cut‑up fowl in a kettle with a tight cover to retain steam.
Add 2 cups of water, salt, and pepper over the chicken.
Cook until the meat easily separates from the bones.
Prepare and set
Remove and chop the meat, discarding skin, bone, and gristle.
Season the chopped meat well and place it in a dish.
Pour the remaining cooking juice over the meat.
Let it cool; it will set into a jelly that can be sliced.
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
What each ingredient does
- Fowls
- Provide the meat that is chopped and pressed into the dish.
- Water
- Creates the cooking liquid that becomes the juices that set into a jelly.
The step that matters
Cooking the fowl until the meat easily separates from the bones. Long, gentle simmering breaks down collagen in the connective tissue and bones. This releases gelatin into the cooking liquid, which is what lets the juices set into a sliceable jelly once cooled.
“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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