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Little Creams of Chicken

A poached chicken mousse made with ground chicken, breadcrumbs, Bechamel, cream, and eggs, served with Supreme sauce and truffle.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Little Creams of Chicken

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Remove skin and bones from the chicken and grind the meat twice using a sausage machine.

  2. In a bowl, mix 12 ounces of ground chicken, 6 ounces of panard, 2 tablespoons of Bechamel sauce, 1 ounce of butter, 3 eggs, 1 teaspoon of salt, and ½ teaspoon of white pepper until smooth.

  3. Add 2 tablespoons of thick cream and rub the mixture through a fine sieve.

Mould and poach

  1. Grease small bombe moulds with butter and fill them with the chicken mixture using a piping bag.

  2. Tap the moulds on the table to remove air bubbles and smooth the tops with a knife dipped in boiling water.

  3. Place a folded paper in the bottom of a stewpan and stand the moulds on it.

  4. Pour boiling water into the pan until it reaches three-fourths up the moulds, cover, and poach for 30 minutes.

Serve

  1. Turn out the creams and place each on an artichoke bottom, pour Supreme sauce over, sprinkle with chopped truffle, and serve.

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  3. Sauce + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Chicken + meattop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,449 recipes

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

  5. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Forms the main body of the mousse, giving it its structure once cooked.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and set when poached, giving the mousse firmness.
Panard (bread crumbs)
Absorb moisture and help give the mixture body and a tender texture.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, giving a smoother, softer texture.
Thick cream
Adds moisture and richness, keeping the mousse light and smooth.

The step that matters

Removing air bubbles and poaching gently. Trapped air leaves holes and uneven texture in the set mousse. Tapping the moulds releases bubbles, and poaching in water kept below a boil lets the eggs set gently without curdling or puffing.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, meat, bread, sauce, butter, egg, cream):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Garlicfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, meat, bread, sauce, butter, egg, cream. 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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