Skip to main content
Main

Chicken Soup

A hearty soup made from a whole hen, chicken feet, heart, gizzard, liver, parsley root, onion, asparagus, and optional grains, finished with beaten egg yolks.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Chicken Soup

Why it works: Chicken and rice are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,769 recipes. Both carry (e,e)-2,4-decadienal, which smells fatty, deep fried. The science ↓

Chicken Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the hen

  1. Clean and singe the hen.

  2. Soak the hen in fresh water for 30 minutes.

  3. Scald the chicken feet.

  4. Scrape off the skin of the feet.

  5. Crack the feet in two.

Make the soup

  1. Boil the feet, heart, and gizzard for at least 3 hours.

  2. Add parsley root, onion, and asparagus to the pot.

  3. Season the soup with salt.

  4. Add rice, barley, noodles, or dumplings if desired.

  5. Skim the soup carefully when it begins to boil.

  6. Strain the soup.

  7. Skim off any fat.

Finish and serve

  1. Beat the yolks of 2 eggs with 1 tablespoon of cold water.

  2. Add the beaten yolks to the soup just before 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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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 + ricetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,769 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

  2. Asparagus + ricetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together261 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  3. Parsley + asparagustop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together566 recipes

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

  4. Chicken + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,814 recipes

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

  5. Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 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

Hen
Gives the broth its main body and rich, meaty flavour as it simmers.
Chicken feet
Release gelatin during long simmering, giving the broth body and a silky mouthfeel.
Eggs
Yolks are beaten into the hot soup to thicken it slightly and add richness.
Parsley root
Adds earthy, aromatic flavour to the broth as it simmers.
Onion
Adds savoury sweetness and aroma to the broth as it cooks.

The step that matters

Skim the soup carefully when it begins to boil. Skimming removes foam of coagulated proteins and impurities that would otherwise cloud the broth and muddy its flavour.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, liver, onion, asparagus, rice, egg):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, liver, onion, asparagus, rice, egg. 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.

More chicken soup recipes

White 9Almond 8Creamy 7Friar's 6Plain 5with Dumplings 3 See all 163 →

You might also like

Chicken BrothChicken Broth257 recipesAsparagus SoupAsparagus Soup179 recipesCreamed ChickenCreamed Chicken89 recipesRice FrittersRice Fritters84 recipes