Name: Chicken Rissoles
Ingredients: ½ pound puff pastry; 1 tablespoon grated cheese; juice of ½ onion; 1 tablespoon chopped parsley; ¼ teaspoon pepper; ¼ teaspoon salt; ½ pound finely minced white meat of cold chicken; clear stock; grated cheese for topping

Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Chicken Rissoles

Oven, in the book's wordsA fairly brisk oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a fairly brisk oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

Prepare ½ pound of puff pastry without sugar.
Mix in 1 tablespoon of grated cheese, juice of ½ onion, chopped parsley, pepper, and salt, then blend this mixture with ½ pound of finely minced cold chicken.
Form the mixture into moderate-sized balls or large spoonfuls.

Cook and serve

Poach the balls in a little clear stock until cooked.
Arrange them on a dish, sprinkle thickly with grated cheese.
Place in a 400°F (200°C) oven until nicely browned.
Serve with tomato sauce.

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.

Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together34,122 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Onion + chickentop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together17,814 recipes

Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).
Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together25,843 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together68,474 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Meat + chickentop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,449 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Puff pastry: Provides a light, flaky wrapper that becomes crisp and golden when baked.
Grated cheese: Adds savoury flavour and helps the topping brown in the oven.
Minced chicken: Forms the main body of the rissoles, giving them substance and a tender texture.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cheese, onion, pepper, meat, chicken):

Garlicfits better
Thymefits better
Celeryfits about as well
Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cheese, onion, pepper, meat, chicken. 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.