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Timbales of Chicken

A baked chicken timbale filled with finely chopped meat, sweet cream, baking soda, salt, pepper, and folded egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Timbales of Chicken

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Chop the meat of the fowl very fine until it resembles powder.

  2. Stir a pinch of baking soda into ½ cup of sweet cream and season with salt and white pepper.

Make the custard

  1. Mix the chopped meat with the cream and gently fold in the beaten egg whites.

  2. Grease timbale molds with butter and fill them with the mixture.

Bake and serve

  1. Place the molds in a pan of boiling water, cover the pan, and bake for 15 minutes at 400°F (200°C).

  2. Turn the timbales out onto hot plates and pour white sauce around each.

  3. Serve immediately, as they will fall quickly.

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

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

  2. Cream + saucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Meat + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,594 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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

Fowl meat
Finely chopped meat forms the body and structure of the timbales once cooked.
Egg whites
Beaten whites trap air, giving the timbales a light, risen texture as they set.
Sweet cream
Adds moisture and richness, keeping the chopped meat tender rather than dry.

The step that matters

Gently fold in the beaten egg whites. Beaten whites hold the air that lightens the timbales. Stirring vigorously knocks that air out, so the mixture bakes denser and less risen.

Swap the white pepper

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, cream, egg, butter, sauce. 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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