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Chicken Soup

A broth made by simmering a whole chicken with rice, herbs, onions, celery, and parsley, served with butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Chicken Soup

Why it works: Celery and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,810 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Chicken Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the chicken and place it in a pot.

  2. Cover with water and add salt.

  3. Pick and wash the rice.

Make the soup

  1. Add the rice, sweet herbs, onions, and celery to the pot when the water begins to boil.

  2. Add the minced parsley and let the soup boil for a few more minutes.

  3. Season with pepper and salt to taste.

  4. If desired, add allspice.

Dumplings and serving

  1. If desired, substitute noodles or dumplings for the rice.

  2. To make dumplings, mix 1 teaspoon butter, 2 teaspoons flour, and enough water to form a soft dough.

  3. Drop teaspoonfuls of the dough into the boiling soup and cook for a few minutes.

  4. Serve the chicken with drawn butter.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

  2. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Parsley + allspicetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,289 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + allspicetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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 and flavour that gives the soup its body.
Rice
Thickens the broth slightly as its starch releases during simmering.
Onions
Add sweetness and savoury depth as they soften in the broth.
Celery
Adds a fresh, aromatic background note to the soup.
Flour (in the method)
Gives the dumpling dough structure so it holds together when cooked in liquid.

The step that matters

Adding the dumpling dough to the boiling soup. The soup must be at a rolling boil when the dough is dropped in. Otherwise the dumplings cook unevenly and can turn gummy or fall apart, since the starch needs heat to set.

Swap the allspice

The recipe marks allspice as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, rice, onion, celery, parsley, pepper, butter):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Garlicfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Allspicethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, rice, onion, celery, parsley, pepper, butter. 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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