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Fricassee of Fowl

A stew of chicken pieces simmered in a sauce of butter, flour, stock, cream, and egg yolks.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley 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 ↓

Fricassee of Fowl

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken

  1. Wash the chicken pieces and place them in a stewpan covered with water.

  2. Season with salt, pepper, parsley, cloves, and mace; boil for 20 minutes.

  3. Strain the stock into a basin and remove the chicken pieces, trimming them well.

Make the sauce

  1. In another stewpan, melt the butter and mix in the flour; moisten with the stock.

  2. Add the chicken pieces and stir occasionally until boiling; skim off any foam.

  3. Add the button onions and simmer until tender.

  4. Mix the cream with the egg yolks and stir into the stewpan, heating gently without boiling.

Serve

  1. Remove the chicken pieces, place them on a dish, pour the sauce over, and serve.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Parsley + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,768 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Clove + macetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Provides the main meat, which is poached in seasoned stock to become tender.
Butter
Enriches the sauce and carries flavor when melted with the flour.
Flour
Thickens the stock into a smooth, cohesive sauce when cooked with the butter.
Egg yolks
Thicken and enrich the sauce when gently heated, adding body and richness.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, silky texture to the sauce.
Button onions
Add mild sweetness and soft texture as they simmer in the sauce.

The step that matters

Heating the cream and egg yolk mixture. Egg yolks thicken by gentle heat, but boiling can curdle them into grainy lumps. Keep the sauce just below a boil once they are added.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Garlicfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, pepper, parsley, clove, butter, flour, onion. 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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