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Broiled Chicken

A whole chicken roasted over a hot broiler, basted with melted butter and seasoned with pepper, coarse sea salt, parsley, and cresses.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Broiled Chicken

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Singe, draw, clean, split, and spread the chickens, securing with a skewer through the wings and underside.

  2. Preheat the broiler very hot, preferably using a wood fire.

Broil

  1. Place the chicken with the bone side facing the hot coals.

  2. If broiling over the fire, cover the chicken with a plate.

  3. Put a pan under the gridiron to catch the juices and baste with melted butter.

  4. Broil for about half the time with the bone side toward the fire, approximately 15 minutes.

  5. When nearly done, turn the breast side toward the fire and broil until nicely browned, being careful not to scorch.

Serve

  1. Serve with melted butter, pepper, coarse sea salt, and chopped parsley; garnish with cresses.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  3. Chicken + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,902 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  4. Chicken + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,958 recipes

    Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).

  5. Chicken + parsleytop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,314 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Small chickens
Provide the main protein, which is cooked whole and split flat for even broiling.
Melted butter
Adds fat for basting, helping the skin brown and keeping the meat moist.

The step that matters

Turning the breast toward the fire. Once the chicken is nearly done, the breast cooks quickly over direct heat. Watching closely lets it brown nicely before the proteins and sugars scorch and turn bitter.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Thymefits about as well
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Garlicfits about as well
  4. Tarragonfits about as well

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