Why it works: Chicken and rice are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,769 recipes. Both carry (e,e)-2,4-decadienal, which smells fatty, deep fried. The science ↓
Gumbo Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the chicken
Cut the chicken into joints and roll them in flour.
Fry or sauté the chicken in a little lard until browned.
Make the soup
Remove the chicken and sauté the sliced gumbo until brown.
Drain the chicken and gumbo, leaving about 1 tablespoon of fat in the pan.
Add 1 tablespoon of browned flour to the fat and stir.
Pour in 3 pints of water, then add the chicken and gumbo.
Simmer all together for 2 hours.
Strain the soup through a colander.
Serve
Serve the soup with boiled rice on the side.
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.
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Chicken + ricetop 5% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,769 recipes
Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).
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Pepper + ricetop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,379 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Flour + ricetop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,611 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Chicken + peppertop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together19,958 recipes
Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).
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Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together50,459 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Chicken
- Provides the meat and rich flavour that the soup is built on.
- Flour
- Browned flour thickens the fat and gives the soup body and a toasted, nutty colour.
- Gumbo
- Sliced gumbo is browned and simmered to add its distinctive flavour and body to the soup.
- Lard
- Fat for frying the chicken, adding richness and helping it brown.
The step that matters
Browning the flour in the fat. Flour cooked in fat must be stirred and toasted to a good brown before liquid goes in. Under-browned flour leaves a raw, pasty taste, while over-browned flour turns bitter.
“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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