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Ox-Cheek Soup

A hearty soup made from ox cheeks, vegetables, and broth, thickened with flour and finished with sherry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Ox-Cheek Soup

Why it works: Turnip and leek match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,046 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Ox-Cheek Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the meat and broth

  1. Blanch the ox-cheeks in boiling water.

  2. Remove the gills and bones, chop the bones, and cut the flesh into medium-sized pieces, leaving the cheek part whole.

  3. In a stewpan, combine the chopped bones, flesh, water, salt, peppercorns, carrots, turnips, leek, celery, parsley, thyme, and bay leaf.

  4. Simmer for six hours, skimming regularly.

  5. Remove the cheek meat and strain the broth through a fine sieve into another stewpan.

Thicken and finish

  1. Mix the flour with the cold broth and pour it into the strained broth, stirring until boiling.

  2. Add the finely chopped celery and sherry, then simmer until the celery is tender.

  3. Cut the meat into small square pieces and keep warm in a tureen.

  4. When the soup is ready, pour it over the meat and serve, adding browning for color.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Turnip + leektop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,046 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

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

  4. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  5. Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Ox-cheeks
Provide the meat and body that give the soup its rich, savory character.
Flour
Thickens the strained broth as it boils, giving the soup body.
Sherry
Adds a sweet, aromatic acidity that rounds out the broth.
Celery
Contributes aromatic flavor to the broth and tender pieces to the soup.
Bones (in the method)
Release gelatin and savory flavor into the long-simmered broth.

The step that matters

Skimming during the six-hour simmer. Skimming regularly removes foam and impurities that would otherwise cloud the broth and taint its flavor. Keeping the liquid at a gentle simmer rather than a hard boil keeps the broth clear and the meat tender.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (carrot, turnip, leek, parsley, thyme, flour, sherry):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Celerythe original
  3. Tarragonfits about as well
  4. Capersfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against carrot, turnip, leek, parsley, thyme, flour, sherry. 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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