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Chicken Loaf

A loaf of chicken and veal mixture formed into balls, browned and simmered in gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,673 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Chicken Loaf

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Remove the flesh from the chickens.

  2. Chop the flesh finely with the veal and almonds.

  3. Add the crushed crackers, flour, curry powder, and salt to the mixture.

  4. Form the mixture into balls.

Brown and simmer

  1. Brown the balls in salt-pork fat or butter with a sliced onion.

  2. Remove the balls. Add more butter if needed.

  3. Dilute the remaining fat with milk, water, or stock. Let it boil.

  4. Strain the sauce over the balls, covering them halfway. Let the sauce simmer for about 45 minutes.

Finish and serve

  1. Brush the balls with butter. Broil until golden brown.

  2. Serve with the cooking gravy poured over. Sprinkle with fine-chopped cress.

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. Almond + flourtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Almond + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Chicken + vealtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,243 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-butanedione (buttery, creamy).

Flour and butter 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 main body of the loaf, binding into a meaty mass when chopped.
Veal
Adds body and a softer, tender texture to the chopped meat mixture.
Blanched almonds
Add richness and body to the mixture, helping it hold together.
Crackers
Absorb moisture and help bind the mixture so the balls hold their shape.
Flour
Thickens the cooking liquid and helps bind the mixture.
Curry powder
Supplies the main spiced aroma and flavor of the dish.

The step that matters

Simmering the sauce over the balls. Simmering gently keeps the balls tender and cooked through while the flour thickens the liquid; a hard boil can toughen the meat and break up the sauce.

Swap the almond

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

  1. Almondthe original
  2. Peanutfits about as well
  3. Walnutfits less well
  4. Chestnutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, veal, flour, butter, milk. 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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