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Chicken a LA Reine

Chicken à la Reine is a boiled chicken served with a saffron and ham infused sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,451 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Chicken a LA Reine

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken

  1. Clean the chicken.

  2. Truss the chicken.

  3. Place the chicken in a pot of boiling water. Skim the surface as it boils.

  4. Add garlic, salt, cayenne, ham, and saffron to the pot.

  5. Boil for 1 to 2 hours until the chicken is tender.

  6. Remove the chicken from the pot.

  7. Place the chicken in a colander over hot water.

Make the sauce

  1. Boil down the sauce for 15 to 30 minutes until it thickens.

  2. Strain the sauce.

  3. Return the strained sauce to the heat.

  4. Mix cornstarch with cold water.

  5. Add the cornstarch mixture to the boiling sauce until thickened like cream.

Serve

  1. Serve the chicken with ham, drizzled with sauce, and extra sauce on the side.

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. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Clove + saffrontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together455 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Pepper + saffrontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together781 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Chicken + garlictop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,850 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-ethyl-2,5-dimethylpyrazine (roasted, nutty).

  5. Garlic + peppertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,090 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Forms the main body of the dish and becomes tender through long gentle simmering.
Cornstarch
Thickens the sauce into a smooth, creamy consistency when heated with liquid.
Ham
Adds savory, salty flavor to the poaching liquid and is served alongside the chicken.
Saffron
Contributes aroma and a golden color to the poaching liquid and sauce.

The step that matters

Add the cornstarch mixture to the boiling sauce. Cornstarch must be mixed with cold water first and added to a boiling liquid so the starch granules swell evenly and thicken. Adding it dry or to a cool sauce causes lumps or a thin result.

Swap the saffron

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

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Rosemaryfits better
  4. Saffronthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, clove, garlic, pepper, ham. 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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