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Chicken with Rice and Onions

A baked casserole of chicken, rice, onions, and cream, seasoned with salt and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Rice and chicken are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,769 recipes. Both carry (e,e)-2,4-decadienal, which smells fatty, deep fried. The science ↓

Chicken with Rice and Onions

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

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Place the onions in a baking dish with the rice and chopped chicken.

  3. Pour the chicken stock over the mixture.

  4. Season with salt and pepper, then dot with butter.

Bake and serve

  1. Cover the dish and bake for 1 hour.

  2. Uncover, add the cream, and bake for an additional 15 minutes.

  3. Serve in the baking dish.

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. Rice + chickentop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,769 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  3. Onion + chickentop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,814 recipes

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

  4. Onion + ricetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,433 recipes

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

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 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

Rice
Absorbs the chicken stock as it cooks, becoming tender and giving the casserole its body.
Chicken stock
Supplies the liquid that cooks the rice and carries flavour through the whole dish.
Cream
Added near the end to enrich the sauce and add a smooth, rich texture.
Onions
Soften during baking and add sweetness and savoury depth to the casserole.

The step that matters

Covering the dish while baking. Keeping the lid on traps steam so the rice cooks through in the stock instead of drying out before it becomes tender.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, chicken, meat, cream, pepper, butter):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits about as well
  3. Asparagusfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, chicken, meat, cream, pepper, butter. 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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