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Steamed Chicken, Stuffed

A whole chicken stuffed with oysters and breadcrumbs, steamed and served with a buttery oyster gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Steamed Chicken, Stuffed

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken

  1. Clean the chicken.

  2. Dress the chicken as for roasting.

  3. Mix bread crumbs with pepper, salt, and butter. Add oysters cut into three pieces to the mixture.

  4. Bind the legs and wings to the body with tape.

Steam

  1. Place the chicken in a steamer with a lid or in a tin pail in cold water. Heat gradually to a boil.

  2. Cook for two hours after boiling begins.

  3. Check the breast for tenderness after two hours.

  4. Remove the chicken.

  5. Keep the chicken covered in a hot-water dish.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. Strain the gravy from the steamer or pail into a saucepan.

  2. Stir in butter. Stir in oyster liquor. Stir in flour mixed with cream. Stir in parsley.

  3. Bring the gravy to a boil. Quickly stir in the beaten egg.

  4. Season to taste.

  5. Pour the gravy over the chicken.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + parsleytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Chicken
Provides the main body of the dish, cooked gently by steam until tender.
Bread crumbs
Absorb butter and juices in the stuffing, keeping it moist and giving it body.
Oysters
Add a briny, savoury flavour to the stuffing and the gravy.
Flour
Thickens the gravy so it coats the chicken.
Egg
Enriches and sets the gravy slightly, adding body to its texture.
Cream
Adds richness and smoothness to the gravy.

The step that matters

Quickly stir in the beaten egg. Egg thickens and can scramble if it is added to liquid that is too hot or stirred slowly, so it should be stirred in quickly as the gravy comes to a boil.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Nutmegfits about as well
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Garlicfits about as well
  4. Celeryfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, bread, pepper, butter, oyster, flour, 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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