Why it works: Meat and chicken are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,449 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓
Chicken Sandwiches
Ingredients
Directions
Chop the white meat of a boiled chicken very fine.
Mix the chicken with sweet cream to form a paste.
Season the mixture with paprika or cayenne and celery salt.
Spread the mixture onto slices of bread to make sandwiches.
If cream is unavailable, use butter instead for mixing.
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.
-
Meat + chickentop 13% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,449 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
-
Chicken + breadtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,258 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity).
-
Meat + breadtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,924 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
-
Chicken + celerytop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,375 recipes
Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
-
Celery + breadtop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,110 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
Swap the celery
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, chicken, cream, bread):
- Garlicfits better
- Nutmegfits about as well
- Celerythe original
- Thymefits about as well
Fit is the average pairing score against meat, chicken, cream, bread. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
More chicken sandwich recipes
You might also like
The free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.
Cornbread345 recipes
Bread Pudding336 recipes
Nut Bread109 recipes
Wheat Bread65 recipes