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Potted Chicken

A preserved chicken mixture set in clarified butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Potted Chicken

Why it works: Chicken and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 13,902 recipes. Both carry 2-furfurylthiol, which smells coffee, roasted. The science ↓

Potted Chicken

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken

  1. Remove skin and bones from the chicken and mince it finely.

  2. Mix the minced chicken with butter and season with salt, cayenne, and mace gradually until the desired flavor is achieved.

Pot and set

  1. Press the mixture into small jars or pots.

  2. Pour clarified butter over the top, ensuring it is not hot to prevent it from sinking into the meat.

  3. Let it set for 20 minutes.

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.

  1. Chicken + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,902 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  2. Pepper + macetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,257 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Chicken + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,958 recipes

    Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).

  4. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

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

  5. Butter + macetop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,405 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

Pepper and mace barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,257 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Forms the bulk of the spread and gives it its firm, meaty texture.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth, spreadable texture that helps the mixture hold together.
Ground mace
Adds a warm, aromatic spice flavor to the meat.

The step that matters

Pouring the clarified butter. The butter must be warm but not hot. Hot fat sinks into the meat instead of forming a clean seal on top, which leaves the surface uneven and less protected.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Garlicfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, pepper, butter. 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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