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Boiled Fowl

A gelatinous dish made from boiled fowl stock, meat, eggs, and gelatin, set in a mold and garnished with herbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Egg and watercress work together. They rank in the top 20% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 638 recipes. Both carry 2-methylbutyraldehyde, which smells malty, chocolate. The science ↓

Boiled Fowl

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the stock

  1. Cool the boiled fowl.

  2. Skim the liquid.

  3. Measure out 3 cups of the liquid.

  4. Cool the liquid.

  5. Soak the gelatin in 24 cups of cold water for 30 minutes.

  6. Dissolve the gelatin over hot water.

  7. Add the dissolved gelatin to the 3 cups of reserved stock.

  8. Season the mixture with salt.

Prepare the eggs and meat

  1. Shell the hard‑boiled eggs.

  2. Slice the eggs after cooling.

  3. Chop the cooked fowl meat finely.

  4. Keep dark and light meat separate.

Layer and set

  1. Layer dark meat in a square‑cornered pan.

  2. Moisten the dark meat with the prepared liquid.

  3. Add a layer of sliced eggs.

  4. Add a layer of white meat.

  5. Add liquid as needed.

  6. Continue layering until all ingredients are used.

  7. Ensure the meat does not float.

  8. If the liquid sinks, pour any leftover liquid on top.

  9. Keep the mold in a cold place until set.

Serve

  1. Cut the set mold into neat slices.

  2. Garnish with watercress or parsley.

  3. Serve alone or with Sauce Tartare.

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. Egg + watercresstop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together638 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

  2. Egg + meattop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,432 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Meat + watercresstop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together70 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

  4. Gelatin + eggtop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Gelatin + watercresstop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Gelatin
Sets the stock into a firm, sliceable jelly once chilled.
Reserved stock from boiled fowl
Provides the savory liquid that becomes the jelly around the meat.
Hard-boiled eggs
Add firm texture and contrast in each slice of the layered mold.
Cooked fowl meat
Forms the main body of the aspic, providing flavor and substance.

The step that matters

Keep the meat from floating. Meat that rises in the liquid leaves uneven layers. Moistening each layer and adding liquid as needed helps the jelly hold the pieces evenly before it sets.

“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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