Why it works: Chicken and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,814 recipes. Both carry gamma-nonanolactone, which smells coconut, sweet. The science ↓
Chicken Pie
Ingredients
Directions
Wash and dry the chickens, then cut them into joints.
In a saucepan, combine the trimmings, backs, leg bones, salt, peppercorns, mace, and onion.
Cover with water or gelatinous white stock to make the gravy.
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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Chicken + oniontop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together17,814 recipes
Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).
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Chicken + meattop 13% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,449 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
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Ham + meattop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,095 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
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Chicken + hamtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,497 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
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Mace + oniontop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together7,078 recipes
Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
Swap the mace
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, ham, meat, egg, onion):
- Garlicfits better
- Thymefits better
- Celeryfits better
- Macethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, ham, meat, egg, onion. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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