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Chicken Timbale

A baked chicken and egg mixture set in a mould, served with a cream stock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Chicken and mushroom are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,172 recipes. Both carry 1-butyl acetate, which smells fruity, banana. The science ↓

Chicken Timbale

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the timbale

  1. Chop the meat from the chicken and pass it through a meat chopper several times.

  2. In a bowl, combine the chopped meat with the eggs, one at a time, beating thoroughly.

  3. Add salt, pepper, celery salt, and mushrooms (if using).

  4. Stir in the heavy cream until well combined.

  5. Grease a mould with butter and decorate with slices of hard-boiled egg or truffles.

  6. Pour the mixture into the mould and cover with buttered paper.

Cook and make the sauce

  1. Cook in a pan of hot water for 30 to 45 minutes until the center feels firm; do not let the water boil.

  2. For the stock, place the chicken bones in cold water, season, and cook slowly for 3 hours.

  3. Reduce the stock to 1 cup, strain, and mix with ½ cup cream thickened with flour and melted butter.

  4. Season to taste and pour around the timbale when serving.

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 + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,172 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-butyl acetate (fruity, banana).

  2. Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  3. Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

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

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

  5. Celery + mushroomtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,006 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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 that sets into a firm, sliceable custard.
Eggs
Bind the chopped meat and set when heated, giving the timbale its structure.
Heavy cream
Adds moisture and richness, keeping the set mixture tender rather than dry.
Flour
Thickens the cream sauce so it coats the timbale smoothly.

The step that matters

Cook in gently simmering, not boiling, water. Egg proteins set smoothly at moderate heat. Boiling water cooks the outside too fast, causing the mixture to curdle, crack, or turn grainy and spongy.

Swap the celery

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, meat, egg, pepper, mushroom, cream, 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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