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Shaker Fricasseed Chicken

A chicken fricassee cooked in water, then browned, finished with cream, flour, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Shaker Fricasseed Chicken

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and steam

  1. Cut the chicken into pieces for fricassee.

  2. Place the chicken in a kettle with a perforated stand at the bottom to prevent burning.

  3. Add enough water to steam the chicken and cook for 1 hour.

Brown and finish

  1. Once the meat is tender, transfer it to the oven and brown thoroughly.

  2. Add rich cream to the gravy, thickening it with a little flour and butter, and season to taste.

  3. Serve in deep dishes.

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. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  4. Cream + flourtop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

  5. Chicken + creamtop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,241 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

Flour and butter 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, which becomes tender through gentle steaming.
Rich cream
Adds richness and body to the gravy.
Flour
Thickens the gravy as it cooks with the fat and liquid.
Butter
Adds fat for flavor and helps the flour thicken the gravy smoothly.

The step that matters

Thickening the gravy with flour and butter. Flour must be cooked with the butter before the liquid is added, or it stays starchy and lumpy. Adding cream too early or at high heat can cause it to split or thin the sauce. Gentle heat keeps the gravy 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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