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Fricassee of Chicken

A creamy chicken stew made with butter, flour, stock, carrot, onion, parsley, bay leaf, and mace.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,053 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Fricassee of Chicken

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce base

  1. In a pot, melt the butter over medium heat.

  2. Add the chopped carrot and onion, and sauté until softened.

  3. Stir in the flour and cook for a minute.

  4. Gradually add the stock or milk, stirring constantly until thickened.

Finish and simmer

  1. Add the chicken, parsley, bay leaf, and mace.

  2. Simmer gently until heated through and flavors meld.

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. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

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

  2. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Chicken + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  5. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Enriches the sauce and carries the flavor of the aromatics into the dish.
Flour
Thickens the stock or milk into a smooth, cohesive sauce as it cooks.
Stock or milk
Forms the liquid base of the sauce, which thickens as the flour cooks in.
Chicken
Provides the main protein, gently heated through in the finished sauce.
Onion
Builds a sweet, savory aromatic base as it softens in the butter.

The step that matters

Gradually add the stock or milk, stirring constantly until thickened. Adding liquid slowly while stirring keeps the flour dispersed, so the sauce thickens smoothly without lumps.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, milk, carrot, onion, parsley, butter, flour):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Celeryfits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, milk, carrot, onion, parsley, butter, flour. 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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