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Jellied Chicken

A chicken dish set in a jelly made from its own stock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,430 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Jellied Chicken

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken and jelly

  1. Boil the chicken in 1 quart of water until tender.

  2. Remove the meat and return the skin and bones to the pot.

  3. Boil the liquid down to 1 pint of jelly, about 45 minutes.

Make the chicken mixture

  1. Chop the chicken meat finely.

  2. Pound the chopped meat.

  3. Mix in the mustard, salt, butter, pepper, and ½ cup of strained jelly.

Layer and set

  1. Pour the remaining jelly into a mold and let it cool.

  2. Warm the chicken mixture in a saucepan to combine thoroughly, then spread it on top of the cooled jelly in the mold.

  3. Set the mold in a cool place.

Unmold

  1. Briefly place the mold in hot water.

  2. Turn the mold out.

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. Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Chicken + mustardtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,192 recipes

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

  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. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 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

Chicken
Provides the meat that forms the body of the dish.
Liquid jelly
Sets firm as it cools, giving the dish its jellied structure and holding its shape.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture to the chopped chicken mixture.
Powdered mustard
Adds a sharp, pungent flavour that cuts through the richness of the chicken and jelly.

The step that matters

Briefly place the mold in hot water. A short dip loosens the jelly from the mold walls so it releases cleanly. Leaving it too long softens the jelly's surface and edges, which can make the unmolded shape collapse.

Swap the mustard

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Onionfits better
  4. Mustardthe original

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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