Skip to main content
Main

To Clear Stock

A stock clarified with thick jelly, eggs, carrot, and beef.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Carrot and beef are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,606 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

To Clear Stock

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Remove the grease from the stock carefully.

  2. Add the thick jelly, eggs, carrot, and beef to a bowl and mix thoroughly.

Simmer and strain

  1. Transfer the mixture to a soup kettle and simmer on low heat for 2 to 3 hours.

  2. Strain the stock using a funnel-shaped tin strainer to achieve a clear liquid.

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. Carrot + beeftop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,606 recipes

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

  2. Egg + beeftop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Egg + carrottop 35% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Thick jelly
Forms the liquid base that carries the flavor of the finished stock.
Eggs
Egg whites set as they heat, trapping suspended particles so the stock becomes clear.
Raw lean beef
Adds savory meaty flavor to the stock as it simmers.

The step that matters

Simmer on low heat. Keep the stock barely simmering, not boiling. Vigorous boiling breaks up the egg-white raft and churns particles back into the liquid, leaving the stock cloudy.

Swap the carrot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, beef):

  1. Asparagusfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Carrotthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, beef. 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

Roast BeefRoast Beef211 recipesBeef LoafBeef Loaf175 recipesCarrot SoupCarrot Soup134 recipesCorned BeefCorned Beef87 recipes