Why it works: Parsley and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 28,563 recipes. Both carry trans-2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓
Boiled Fowl, with Parsley and Butter
Ingredients
Directions
Clean and singe the fowl, then skewer and tie it in a clean cloth.
Boil the fowl gently in water for about 1 hour, skimming frequently.
Add the bacon and boil for an additional 30 minutes.
Remove the fowl, untie the cloth, and let it drain.
Slice the bacon and arrange it around the fowl, serving the parsley and butter sauce in a sauceboat.
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.
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Parsley + buttertop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together28,563 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
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