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Chicken Sandwiches

A sandwich made with chopped chicken, olives, mayonnaise, lettuce, and bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Olive and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,580 recipes. Both carry trans-2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Chicken Sandwiches

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

  1. Combine the chopped chicken and stuffed olives in a bowl.

  2. Season the mixture heavily.

  3. Mix in enough mayonnaise dressing until the mixture is soft like paste.

Assemble the sandwiches

  1. Cut the bread into your desired shape.

  2. Place a lettuce leaf on a plate.

  3. Spread some of the chicken mixture on the lettuce.

  4. Top with another lettuce leaf.

  5. Cover with a slice of bread.

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. Olive + lettucetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,580 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  2. Chicken + olivetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,888 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid hexyl ester (sweet, green).

  3. Olive + breadtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,091 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  4. Chicken + breadtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,258 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity).

  5. Bread + lettucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together602 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
Forms the bulk of the filling, providing the main body and protein of the sandwich.
Stuffed olives
Add briny, salty flavour that contrasts with the mild chicken.
Mayonnaise dressing
Adds fat and moisture, binding the chopped chicken into a soft, spreadable paste.
Bread
Provides the structure that holds the filling and gives the sandwich its base.

The step that matters

Mix in enough mayonnaise dressing until the mixture is soft like paste. Too little dressing leaves the chicken dry and crumbly, while too much makes the filling runny and soaks the bread. Adding it gradually lets you judge the texture by eye and feel.

Swap the lettuce

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

  1. Tomatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Lettucethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, olive, bread. 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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