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Chicken Bouillon

A clear, seasoned chicken stock made by simmering chicken, onion, celery, and egg white, then straining.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,518 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Chicken Bouillon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the broth

  1. Place the chicken pieces in a large pot with the cold water.

  2. Bring the water to a boil slowly, then reduce heat and simmer for 3 hours until the meat is tender.

  3. Add the sliced onion and celery, and simmer for an additional hour.

Chill and skim

  1. Remove the pot from heat and let it cool in a cold place for several hours.

  2. Once chilled, remove the fat from the surface and strain out the bones.

  3. If the broth has jellied, heat it just enough to melt the jelly.

  4. Strain the broth through coarse muslin without squeezing the bag.

Clarify and season

  1. Heat the broth until lukewarm, then add the unbeaten egg white and broken shell.

  2. Stir to a quick boil and strain again through muslin after seasoning to taste.

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. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Chicken + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  3. Chicken + celerytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,375 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

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

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

  5. Celery + eggtop 34% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,334 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Releases flavor and gelatin into the water as it simmers, giving the broth body.
Egg white
Coagulates as it heats, trapping cloudy particles so the broth clears when strained.
Egg shell
Adds fine particles that help the egg white collect impurities during clarifying.
Celery
Contributes aromatic flavor to the broth during the final simmer.
Onion
Contributes aromatic sweetness and savory depth to the broth.

The step that matters

Stirring the egg white into the broth. Egg white must be added to lukewarm broth and stirred only until it reaches a quick boil. Egg proteins then set around impurities, which the muslin strains out. Boiling vigorously or stirring too long can break up the raft and cloud the broth.

Swap the celery

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

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Thymefits about as well
  3. Capersfits about as well
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, onion, 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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