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 Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the filling
Fricassee the chickens and season them with mushroom powder, mace, nutmeg, and salt.
Stew the giblets with a bit of meat to make gravy.
Add 2 tablespoons of the gravy to the chicken mixture.
Reserve the rest of the gravy to fill or place under the pudding.
Cook
Boil the pudding for 2 hours.
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.
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Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,557 recipes
Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
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Chicken + mushroomtop 4% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,172 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-butyl acetate (fruity, banana).
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Chicken + meattop 13% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,449 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
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Mushroom + nutmegtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,988 recipes
Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).
-
Mushroom + meattop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,423 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
- Young chickens
- Provides the main meat, which becomes tender and forms the body of the filling as it cooks.
- Gravy
- Adds moisture and savoury flavour to the chicken mixture.
Swap the mace
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, mushroom, nutmeg, meat):
- Thymefits better
- Marjoramfits better
- Rosemaryfits better
- Macethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, mushroom, nutmeg, meat. 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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