Name: Mould of Chicken and Rice
Ingredients: 1 cup boiled rice; 2 cups chicken or other stock; 1 teaspoon pepper; ¼ teaspoon coarse sea salt; 1 tablespoon onion juice; 1 tablespoon celery, chopped; 1 raw egg; Fine bread crumbs, for lining; Cold cooked chicken, minced and seasoned

Why it works: Pepper and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,012 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Mould of Chicken and Rice

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the rice

Boil rice in stock seasoned with pepper, salt, onion juice, and celery for 20 minutes.
Drain the rice and beat in the raw egg while hot; let it cool and stiffen.

Build the mold

Grease a mould and line it with the rice, making it nearly an inch thick and hollowing it out.
Fill the mould with minced chicken, add a layer of rice on top, and cover with a lid.

Cook and serve

Place the mould in a pot of hot water and cook for 1 hour.
Turn out onto a hot platter and serve with curry or tomato sauce.

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.

Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together16,012 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Rice + chickentop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,769 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).
Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,518 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Rice + celerytop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,169 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Chicken + oniontop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together17,814 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Boiled rice: Forms the firm outer shell that holds the chicken filling in shape.
Raw egg: Binds the rice so it sets firm enough to hold its shape when turned out.
Chicken stock: Gives the rice savory flavor and moisture as it cooks.
Cold cooked chicken: Provides the main filling and savory flavor of the mold.

The step that matters

Let the rice cool and stiffen before lining the mold. The egg sets as the rice cools, so the rice must firm up before shaping. If it is still hot and loose, the lining will slump or tear when the mold is filled and turned out.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, chicken, pepper, celery, egg, bread):

Capsicumfits better
Tomatofits better
Asparagusfits better
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, chicken, pepper, celery, egg, bread. 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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Chicken Broth257 recipes

Chicken Soup156 recipes

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Mould of Chicken and Rice