Skip to main content
Main

Parsnip Stew

A stew of parsnips, salt pork, thyme, and dumplings cooked in water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Parsnip and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 270 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Parsnip Stew

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Fry the salt pork in a flat-bottomed kettle until browned, then remove it.

  2. Layer half of the parsnips evenly in the kettle.

  3. Add the pork scraps on top of the parsnips, then layer the remaining parsnips.

Simmer and finish

  1. Season with salt, pepper, and thyme, then add enough water to cover.

  2. When nearly done, add the dumplings and cover tightly.

  3. Cook for 15 minutes without removing the cover.

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. Parsnip + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together270 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Pepper + thymetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Parsnip + biscuittop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Parsnip + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,109 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Thyme + biscuittop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together73 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

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

What each ingredient does

Parsnips
Provide the main body of the stew and a sweet, earthy flavor as they soften.
Salt pork
Renders fat and savory flavor into the kettle as it browns, seasoning the stew.
Dumplings
Steam on top of the stew while covered, becoming light and soft in the liquid.

The step that matters

Cover tightly and leave the lid on. Lifting the lid lets steam escape, so the dumplings can dry out or turn heavy and the stew loses heat. Keeping the cover on traps steam so the dumplings cook through.

Swap the parsnip

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, pepper, thyme, tea, biscuit):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Mustardfits better
  4. Parsnipthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, pepper, thyme, tea, biscuit. 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.

You might also like

Pork CakePork Cake107 recipesRoast PorkRoast Pork82 recipesPotato BiscuitPotato Biscuit32 recipesParsnip CakesParsnip Cakes12 recipes