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Raised Chicken Pie

A pie of cooked chicken topped with sweetbread ragout and encased in a forcemeat crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Raised Chicken Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the chicken

  1. In a stewpan, combine chicken, butter, lemon juice, pepper, salt, parsley, thyme, shallots, and mace.

  2. Cook until chicken is done, then remove and let cool.

Assemble and bake

  1. Prepare the crust and place light forcemeat at the bottom of the pie dish.

  2. Layer the cooked chicken on top of the forcemeat and add more forcemeat around the top.

  3. Cover the pie and bake gently at 350°F (175°C) until golden.

Serve

  1. When serving, cut off the lid and add a ragout of sweetbreads.

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. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Lemon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Lemon + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,973 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Parsley + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

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

  5. Thyme + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,476 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Forms the main filling, cooked gently in butter and lemon juice until tender.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture to the chicken as it cooks.
Shallots
Add a mild savoury sweetness and aroma to the filling.
Light forcemeat
Forms a soft layer beneath and around the chicken, giving the pie a tender, moist texture.
Sweetbread ragout
Adds a rich, delicate meaty element spooned in at serving.

The step that matters

Baking gently until golden. Gentle heat lets the forcemeat and filling set through without drying or toughening, while the crust browns slowly. High heat can overcook the outside before the centre is set.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, butter, lemon, pepper, parsley, thyme, shallot):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Winter savoryfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, butter, lemon, pepper, parsley, thyme, shallot. 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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