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Fricasseed Chicken

A braised chicken dish with onion, parsley, pork fat, milk gravy, and eggs, served over boiled rice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper 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 ↓

Fricasseed Chicken

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken

  1. Clean and thoroughly dissect the chicken into pieces, ensuring each joint is separate.

  2. Wash the pieces without wiping them dry.

  3. Arrange the pieces in a pot.

  4. Layer the chicken with minced onion, parsley, and chopped fat pork, seasoning with salt and pepper.

Cook the chicken

  1. Cover the pot tightly and cook on low heat for at least one hour without boiling.

  2. Increase the heat slightly and continue to cook slowly until the chicken is tender.

  3. Remove the chicken with a slotted spoon.

  4. Keep the chicken warm on a platter.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. To make the gravy, pour the cooking fat into a bowl set in iced water to separate the fat.

  2. Skim the fat.

  3. Return the fat to the pot.

  4. Add hot milk thickened with butter and flour.

  5. Boil for one minute.

  6. Add a pinch of baking soda.

  7. Gradually mix in the beaten eggs.

  8. Pour the gravy over the chicken.

  9. Serve with a border of boiled rice.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Chicken + porktop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,417 recipes

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

  3. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

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

  5. Onion + parsleytop 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

Chicken
Slow cooking in a covered pot keeps the meat moist and tender.
Fat pork
Renders fat into the pot, adding richness and flavour to the cooking liquid.
Milk
Forms the base of the gravy, adding creaminess and body.
Flour
Thickens the hot milk into a smooth gravy with butter.
Eggs
Enrich and further thicken the gravy when mixed in gradually.
Baking soda
Neutralises acidity in the gravy, helping keep it smooth.

The step that matters

Adding the beaten eggs to the gravy. Eggs can curdle or scramble if added too quickly to hot liquid. Mixing them in gradually, off the boil, lets them thicken the gravy smoothly.

Swap the parsley

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, onion, pork, pepper, milk, butter, flour. 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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