Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
Creamed Chicken
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the chicken
Boil the chicken until tender. Let it cool.
Make the creamed sauce
In a chafing dish, melt the butter until it begins to brown.
Add the chicken and heat thoroughly.
Pour in the milk and season with salt.
Bring to a boil and thicken with flour mixed with a little butter.
Serve
Once thickened, pour the mixture over squares of toast.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Chicken + milktop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,389 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).
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Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Chicken + buttertop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together13,902 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).
Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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
- Chicken
- Provides the main protein and body of the dish once cooked and folded into the sauce.
- Butter
- Adds fat and a nutty aroma when browned, flavouring the base of the sauce.
- Milk
- Forms the liquid base of the sauce, which is then thickened to a creamy consistency.
- Flour
- Thickens the milk into a smooth sauce as it heats and comes to a boil.
The step that matters
Thickening the sauce with flour. Flour must be mixed with butter first and whisked into the boiling milk so it disperses evenly. Added dry or in lumps, it stays clumped and the sauce turns grainy instead of smooth.
“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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