Skip to main content
Main

Creamed Chicken

A creamy chicken dish with mushrooms, sweetbreads, and a breadcrumb topping.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Creamed Chicken

Why it works: Chicken and mushroom are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,172 recipes. Both carry 1-butyl acetate, which smells fruity, banana. The science ↓

Creamed Chicken

Oven, in the book's wordsA very hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a very hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the sauce

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan.

  2. Stir in the flour until smooth.

  3. Add the hot milk and season with onion, nutmeg, pepper, salt, cayenne, and celery seed.

  4. Cook until thickened, then pour over the chicken, sweetbreads, and mushrooms.

Bake and serve

  1. Bring to a boil, then cover with bread crumbs.

  2. Bake at 400°F (200°C) until golden brown.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Chicken + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,172 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-butyl acetate (fruity, banana).

  2. Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Nutmeg + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  4. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Forms the base of the roux and adds richness to the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the cream or milk into a smooth sauce as it cooks.
Cream or milk
Forms the liquid of the sauce, giving it body and a creamy texture.
Sweetbreads
Add a tender, rich texture to the dish.
Mushrooms
Add earthy flavor and moisture to the filling.

The step that matters

Cook until thickened. The flour must be cooked long enough with the hot liquid to swell and set the sauce. Undercooked flour leaves a raw, pasty taste and a thin sauce that will not hold together under the crumbs.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, mushroom, cream, butter, flour, nutmeg, pepper):

  1. Spinachfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, mushroom, cream, butter, flour, nutmeg, pepper. 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.

More creamed chicken recipes

with Mushrooms 5and Mushrooms 4Soup 3Toast 3 See all 110 →

You might also like

Brown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesChicken BrothChicken Broth257 recipesChicken SoupChicken Soup156 recipesCream of Celery SoupCream of Celery Soup113 recipes