Name: To Make Chicken Broth
Ingredients: 1 chicken, skinned; 2 quarts water; a little mace; a small piece of white bread

Why it works: Chicken and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,258 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity. The science ↓

To Make Chicken Broth

Ingredients

1 chicken, skinned
2 quarts water
a little mace
a small piece of white bread

Directions

Boil the chicken in 2 quarts of water with a little mace and a small piece of white bread.
Cook until the liquid reduces to half its original quantity.
Remove the fat from the broth.
Serve the broth hot.

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.

Chicken + breadtop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,258 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity).
Mace + breadtop 24% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,005 recipes

Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).
Chicken + macetop 31% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,208 recipes

Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken: Releases flavour and gelatin into the water as it simmers, giving the broth its body.
White bread: Soaks up fat and impurities from the broth, helping it look clearer.