Why it works: Potato and parsley are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,855 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓
Scalloped Chicken
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare the chicken
Boil the chicken joints until the meat easily separates from the bone.
Remove the bones and chop the chicken into small pieces.
Make the gravy
Thicken the boiling water with flour and season with butter and salt.
Assemble and bake
In a deep dish, layer bread crumbs, chicken, and sliced potatoes alternately, finishing with bread crumbs on top.
Pour the gravy over the layers and add a few bits of butter.
Bake at 400°F (200°C) until nicely browned.
Serve garnished with parsley.
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.
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Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,855 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
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Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Chicken + potatotop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,756 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-decenal (green, must).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + parsleytop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together16,675 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour and butter 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
- Chicken
- Provides the main protein; boiling makes the meat tender and easy to separate from the bone.
- All-purpose flour
- Thickens the boiling water into a gravy that moistens the layers.
- Bread crumbs
- Form the layers and, toasted on top, brown and crisp during baking.
- Potatoes
- Add starch and body, soaking up gravy so the layers hold together.
- Butter
- Adds richness and flavour to the gravy and browns the top as it melts.
The step that matters
Thicken the boiling water with flour. Flour must be whisked in so it disperses without lumps; starch then gelatinises as the liquid heats, giving a smooth gravy rather than a pasty one.
Swap the parsley
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, flour, butter, bread, potato):
- Garlicfits about as well
- Thymefits about as well
- Parsleythe original
- Capersfits about as well
Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, flour, butter, bread, potato. 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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