Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Roast Chicken
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Singe and truss the chicken carefully.
Season the chicken with coarse sea salt.
Place small bits of butter over the meat.
Roast
Put the chicken in a pan with a little water.
Baste occasionally and dredge with flour before removing from the oven.
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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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Chicken + buttertop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together13,902 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).
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Chicken + flourtop 27% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together10,559 recipes
Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).
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
- Whole broiler chicken
- Forms the main dish; its meat cooks through while the skin browns and crisps.
- Butter
- Adds fat that carries heat over the meat, promoting browning and a rich flavor.
- Flour
- Dusted on the hot fat, it helps the skin brown and crisp into a golden surface.
The step that matters
Dredge with flour before removing from the oven. Flour needs hot fat to brown and crisp the skin. Added too early it can scorch or turn pasty, so it should go on near the end of roasting.
“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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