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East Indian Curry

A chicken curry simmered in a spiced flour mixture and served with boiled rice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Chicken and pork match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,417 recipes. Both carry 2-furfurylthiol, which smells coffee, roasted. The science ↓

East Indian Curry

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken

  1. Mix the flour and curry powder together in a bowl.

  2. Dip the chicken pieces into the flour mixture, coating them well.

  3. Fry the chicken in pork or butter until golden brown.

Simmer

  1. Transfer the chicken to a pot.

  2. Cover the chicken with boiling water.

  3. Let it boil slowly until the chicken is tender.

  4. Mix the remaining flour and curry powder with a little water.

  5. Add the mixture to the pot.

  6. Boil for a few more minutes.

  7. Season with salt.

Serve

  1. Serve with boiled rice that is tender but dry.

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

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

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

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

  3. Pork + ricetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,137 recipes

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

  4. Flour + ricetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Chicken + flourtop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together10,559 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

Chicken and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 10,559 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Coats the chicken and, mixed into the liquid, thickens the curry sauce.
Curry powder
Provides the main spice flavour and aroma of the curry.
Chicken
Provides the protein base; slow simmering makes it tender.

The step that matters

Let it boil slowly until the chicken is tender. A gentle simmer lets the connective tissue soften without toughening the meat. A hard, rapid boil tightens the proteins and dries out the chicken, so keep the liquid at a slow simmer.

“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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