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White Consomme of Chicken

A clear chicken broth made by simmering whole chickens with celery seed, mace, parsley, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,810 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

White Consomme of Chicken

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut each chicken into four parts and rinse in cold water to remove blood.

  2. Drain the chickens after 15 minutes and place them in a pot.

Make the broth

  1. Tie the celery seed in a thin piece of muslin and add it to the pot along with the mace and parsley.

  2. Pour in 3 quarts of water and boil gently for 2 hours if the chickens are young, or 3 hours if they are old.

  3. Skim the surface constantly, and when the chickens are tender, strain the broth through a sieve.

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. Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

  2. Mace + white peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,695 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  3. Parsley + white peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

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

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  5. Mace + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,268 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

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

What each ingredient does

Chickens
Provide the flavourful meat and collagen that give the broth its body and savoury depth.
Parsley
Adds a fresh, herbal aroma to the broth.
Celery seed
Contributes a warm, aromatic flavour to the broth.
Mace
Adds a delicate, warm spice aroma to the broth.

The step that matters

Skim the surface constantly. Simmering stirs up fat and coagulated proteins that cloud the broth and can make it greasy. Skimming while it cooks keeps the consommé clear and clean-tasting, and gentle boiling prevents the liquid from churning them back in.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, celery, parsley, white pepper):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, celery, parsley, white 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.

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