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Fricassee of Chiceees

A French stew of chicken pieces simmered in a sauce of butter, onions, flour, egg yolks, cream, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Fricassee of Chiceees

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken

  1. Draw and singe the chickens.

  2. Cut them into neat pieces.

  3. Wash the pieces in tepid water and drain them.

Braise

  1. In a stewpan, melt the butter.

  2. Add the small onions.

  3. Add the chicken pieces.

  4. Cook until firm.

  5. Dredge a little flour over the chicken.

  6. Moisten with water.

  7. Boil slowly for half an hour.

  8. Remove the chicken pieces.

  9. Reduce the sauce.

Finish and serve

  1. Beat the egg yolks.

  2. Mix in the cream and salt.

  3. Combine the egg mixture with the sauce.

  4. Add the chicken.

  5. Bring to a boil briefly.

  6. Serve immediately.

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. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Chicken + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,902 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

Butter and flour 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

Chickens
Provide the meat that is cooked until tender in the sauce.
Butter
Fat that browns the chicken lightly and carries flavour into the sauce.
Flour
Dusted on the chicken to thicken the cooking liquid into a sauce.
Egg yolks
Enrich and thicken the sauce, giving it a smooth, velvety body.
Cream
Adds richness and softens the sauce's flavour when combined with the yolks.

The step that matters

Combine the egg mixture with the sauce. Egg yolks thicken through gentle heat. If the sauce is too hot when they are added, they can scramble and turn grainy, so the mixture should be combined carefully and kept below a boil.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, butter, flour, egg, cream. 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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