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Fricasseed Fowls or Chickens

A fricassee made from chicken, seasoned with mace, savory, lemon, cayenne, and parsley, served hot.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Fricasseed Fowls or Chickens

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken

  1. Remove the skin from the chickens and carve them neatly.

  2. Reserve the wings, breasts, merrythoughts, and thighs.

Make the gravy

  1. Stew the inferior joints with mace and savory until tender.

  2. Strain the stew.

  3. Use the strained liquid to make gravy with butter and flour.

  4. Add lemon juice, cayenne, and minced parsley to the gravy.

  5. Serve the fricassee hot.

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 + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Parsley + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Flour
Thickens the strained liquid into a smooth gravy as it cooks.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that carries flavor and gives the gravy a silky body.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich gravy and balances its flavor.

The step that matters

Use the strained liquid to make gravy with butter and flour. Flour must be cooked in the butter before or while the liquid is added, otherwise the gravy can taste raw and form lumps. Stirring as it simmers keeps it smooth and thickened.

Swap the mace

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, lemon, pepper, 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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