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Fricassee De Poulet I

A French chicken fricassée made with chicken, water, spices, onion, parsley, pork, and a butter‑flour cream sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and 14,037 recipes mention both. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Fricassee De Poulet I

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken

  1. Cut the cleaned chickens into pieces, using finer parts for the fricassée and coarser parts for the sauce.

  2. Place the coarser pieces in a saucepan with water, spices, onion, parsley, and pork.

  3. Simmer for 30 minutes, then add the finer pieces and cook slowly for 1 to 2 hours until tender.

  4. Remove the finer pieces and keep warm while preparing the sauce.

Make the sauce

  1. Strain the gravy and skim off the fat.

  2. In another saucepan, blend butter and flour over low heat without browning.

  3. Add some boiling gravy to the butter‑flour mixture and stir until smooth, then add the rest of the gravy.

  4. Stir and boil for 4 to 5 minutes, then remove from heat.

  5. Quickly stir in the beaten egg yolks mixed with cream and add lemon juice.

  6. Do not boil again after adding the eggs to prevent curdling.

  7. Add white wine and mushrooms if desired.

Serve

  1. Serve the chicken in a border of rice or mashed potatoes with sauce poured over.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Lemon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together14,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Garlic + oniontop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together29,058 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  3. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together34,122 recipes

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

  4. Chicken + porktop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together5,417 recipes

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

  5. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Chickens
Provide the meat and the bones and pieces that flavour the gravy.
Flour
Thickens the gravy when cooked with butter into a smooth sauce.
Butter
Forms a roux with the flour, adding richness and body to the sauce.
Egg yolks
Enrich and thicken the sauce, giving it a silky texture.
Cream
Adds richness and smoothness to the sauce alongside the egg yolks.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich sauce.

The step that matters

Do not boil the sauce after adding the egg yolks. Egg proteins set when heated, so boiling after the yolks go in can curdle and grainy the sauce. Stir them in quickly off the heat.

Flavor stand-ins for the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, lemon, garlic, pepper, parsley, onion, pork):

  1. Thymebetter flavor fit
  2. Marjorambetter flavor fit
  3. Basilbetter flavor fit
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, lemon, garlic, pepper, parsley, onion, pork. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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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