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Jellied Chicken

A chilled gelatin set chicken broth with vegetables and meat pieces.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,053 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Jellied Chicken

Ingredients

Directions

Poach the fowl

  1. Clean the fowl and cover it with boiling water.

  2. Bring the covered fowl to a boil, then skim the surface.

  3. Reduce heat and let it simmer gently until tender.

  4. Remove the fowl from the liquid.

Make the jelly

  1. Once the liquid is cold, skim off the fat.

  2. In a saucepan, combine the liquid with the sliced onion, clove, carrot, salt, and pepper.

  3. Simmer the mixture for 15 minutes.

  4. Add the soaked gelatine, strain the mixture, and pour some into a mold.

Set in the mold

  1. Arrange slices of hard boiled eggs and bits of tongue or ham in the mold.

  2. Pour more of the jelly mixture over the top and refrigerate until set.

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. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

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

  3. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Clove + carrottop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,873 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Fowl
Simmering releases its flavor and collagen into the broth, and its meat becomes the dish's main filling.
Gelatine
Sets the strained broth into a firm jelly that holds its shape when chilled.
Onion
Adds savory depth and aroma to the simmered broth.
Carrot
Adds gentle sweetness and color to the broth.

The step that matters

Skim off the fat once the liquid is cold. Fat left in the broth can make the jelly greasy and cloudy, and it can interfere with a clean, firm set. Chilling lets the fat rise and harden on top so it lifts off easily.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (clove, carrot, pepper, egg, ham, parsley):

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against clove, carrot, pepper, egg, ham, parsley. 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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