Name: Chicken Pie
Ingredients: 1 large chicken or 2 small chickens; coarse sea salt; black pepper; chopped parsley; consommé or white stock; pastry for covering; 3-4 hard-boiled eggs, sliced

Why it works: Pepper and parsley 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 Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

Skin and fillet the chicken(s).
Season the fillets with salt, pepper, and chopped parsley.

Assemble and bake

Arrange the fillets in a pie dish.
Pour in the consommé or white stock.
Cover with pastry and bake at 400°F (200°C) until golden.
Add sliced hard-boiled eggs among the fillets before covering.

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.

Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together34,122 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Chicken + peppertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together19,958 recipes

Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).
Chicken + parsleytop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,314 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Parsley + eggtop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,765 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Chicken + eggtop 30% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,991 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

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, becoming tender and savoury as it bakes.
Consommé or white stock: Adds moisture that keeps the filling juicy during baking.
Pastry: Encloses the filling and browns in the oven to form a golden crust.
Hard-boiled eggs: Add firm texture and richness among the chicken pieces.