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Chicken Pie

A savory pie with chicken, bacon, sausage or veal and ham forcemeat, topped with puff pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Meat and chicken are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,449 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓

Chicken Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the gravy

  1. Remove the meat from the bones.

  2. Return the bones to the pot with the cooking liquid.

  3. Boil until reduced to ½ cup.

  4. Strain.

  5. Skim off the fat from the gravy.

  6. Season the gravy with white pepper and salt.

Assemble the pie

  1. Layer sliced bacon at the bottom of a tart dish and arrange the chicken meat on top.

  2. Mix the sausage meat or forcemeat with the egg yolk and form into small balls.

  3. Place the balls between the pieces of chicken.

  4. Top with the remaining bacon slices.

  5. Pour the gravy into the dish.

  6. Cover with puff pastry.

Bake

  1. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) for 1 hour or until done.

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. Meat + chickentop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  2. Egg + white peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,312 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

  3. Meat + eggtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,432 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Chicken + eggtop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,991 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

  5. Meat + white peppertop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together363 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl butyrate (fruity, apple).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolk
Binds the sausage meat so it holds its small ball shape.
Bacon
Adds fat and savory flavor that moistens the chicken as it cooks.
Sausage meat or veal and ham forcemeat
Adds rich, savory flavor and a firm, sliceable texture to the filling.
Puff pastry
Forms a flaky, browned crust that encloses the filling.

The step that matters

Skim off the fat from the gravy. Fat left in the gravy can make the pie greasy and can keep the pastry from crisping well. Removing it first gives a cleaner-tasting sauce and a crisper crust.

Swap the white pepper

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

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, chicken, egg. 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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