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Minced Chicken in Ramakin Cases

A savory dish of minced chicken and ham baked in ramekins with a buttery sauce and breadcrumb topping.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Minced Chicken in Ramakin Cases

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. Chop the cooked chicken and ham.

Make the sauce

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

  2. Stir in the flour and cook for 1 minute.

  3. Add the milk or stock and bring to a boil, stirring constantly.

  4. Season with pepper, salt, lemon juice, and nutmeg.

  5. If desired, stir in the yolk of one egg.

Bake and serve

  1. Add the chopped meats and heat through.

  2. Serve the mixture in ramekin cases and sprinkle with brown breadcrumbs.

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. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  4. Nutmeg + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  5. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Minced chicken
Forms the main body of the filling and provides the savory meat base.
Butter
Adds richness and carries flavor while it forms the base of the roux.
Flour
Thickens the milk or stock into a smooth sauce that holds the filling together.
Milk or stock
Becomes the liquid of the sauce, giving the filling its creamy moisture.
Chopped ham
Adds salty, savory meat flavor to the chicken filling.

The step that matters

Add the milk or stock and bring to a boil, stirring constantly. Flour must be whisked into the hot liquid without pause, otherwise it clumps and the sauce turns lumpy instead of smooth and thick.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, ham, butter, flour, milk, lemon, pepper):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Marjoramfits about as well
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, ham, butter, flour, milk, lemon, pepper. 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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