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Broiled Spring-chicken

A whole chicken broiled with salt, butter, and pepper until cooked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Chicken and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 13,902 recipes. Both carry 2-furfurylthiol, which smells coffee, roasted. The science ↓

Broiled Spring-chicken

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Thoroughly clean the chicken and let it cool.

  2. Split the chicken at the back and break the breastbone with a mallet.

Broil and serve

  1. Place the chicken on a heated broiler over a medium fire, turning frequently.

  2. When halfway done, season with salt, butter, and pepper.

  3. Continue broiling until well done but not dry, about 30 minutes.

  4. Serve on hot plates.

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 + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,902 recipes

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

  2. Chicken + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,958 recipes

    Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).

  3. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Forms the main body of the dish; broiling cooks it through while turning keeps it from scorching.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, carrying flavor and helping the surface brown and stay moist.
Coarse sea salt
Seasons the meat and draws out surface moisture, helping browning.

The step that matters

Continue broiling until well done but not dry. Chicken dries out quickly over direct heat once the fat has rendered. Turning frequently and stopping at doneness keeps the meat juicy while the skin browns.

“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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