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Chicken Pie

A savory pie with chicken, ham or bacon, force-meat, eggs, gravy, cream, butter, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Mace and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,557 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Chicken Pie

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the filling

  1. Season the cut-up chickens with white pepper, coarse sea salt, mace, and nutmeg.

  2. Layer the chicken, ham or bacon, force-meat, and hard-boiled eggs in a dish.

  3. Prepare gravy using veal knuckle or mutton shank bones, seasoned with herbs and onion.

  4. If using a dish, fill it with gravy.

Make the jelly

  1. If using a raised crust, strain the gravy and let it cool until jelly-like.

  2. Boil the fat to clarify the jelly.

  3. Whip the egg whites.

  4. Strain the mixture through a fine sieve.

Finish and bake

  1. Scald a handful of parsley in milk.

  2. Season the mixture.

  3. Mix the parsley with the chicken or meat and broth.

  4. Raise the crust.

  5. Pour in scalded cream mixed with butter and flour.

  6. Bake until done.

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. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. White pepper + macetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,695 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  3. Chicken + meattop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  4. White pepper + nutmegtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,375 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Ham + meattop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,095 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

What each ingredient does

Chickens
Provide the main meat that forms the body of the pie.
Force-meat
Adds a dense, moist stuffing layer between the chicken and the crust.
Hard-boiled eggs
Add firm set texture and richness to the layered filling.
Egg whites
Whipped to help clarify the jelly and give it a lighter structure.
Cream
Adds richness and moisture to the custard-like liquid poured in.
Flour
Thickens the cream mixture so it sets and holds together.

The step that matters

Strain the mixture through a fine sieve. Straining removes solids and fat so the jelly sets clear and smooth. Cloudy or lumpy gravy will not set firmly, and the pie will look and cut poorly.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, mace, nutmeg, ham, meat, egg, veal):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Clovefits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, mace, nutmeg, ham, meat, egg, veal. 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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