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Chicken Ceoquettes

Chicken Cequeottes are oblong meatballs made from chicken, veal, bread, spices, and eggs, then fried.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Mace and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,557 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Chicken Ceoquettes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the meat

  1. Boil the chicken and veal separately in cold water, just enough to cover them.

  2. Once cooked, pick the meat from the bones and chop it finely.

  3. Soak the bread in the warm chicken broth.

Shape and fry

  1. In a mixing bowl, combine the chopped meat, soaked bread, salt, pepper, mace, nutmeg, and beaten eggs.

  2. Form the mixture into oblong balls.

  3. Fry the balls in equal parts lard and butter until they are brown.

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. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  4. Chicken + vealtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,243 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-butanedione (buttery, creamy).

  5. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the chopped meat and bread so the balls hold their shape.
Bread
Soaked in broth, it adds moisture and softness to the meatballs.
Veal
Provides the main meat body and a tender texture when cooked.
Chicken
Supplies the main meat and flavorful broth used to soak the bread.
Lard and butter
Fat for frying that promotes browning and adds richness to the outside.

The step that matters

Fry the balls until brown. Frying over moderate heat lets the exterior brown through Maillard reactions while the interior heats through. Balls that are fried too hot may scorch outside before the centre is hot, and balls handled roughly while forming may fall apart in the pan.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, veal, bread, pepper, nutmeg, egg, butter):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Sagefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, veal, bread, pepper, nutmeg, egg, 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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