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Brown Soup Stock

A beef and vegetable stock simmered for several hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Brown Soup Stock

Why it works: Thyme and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,225 recipes. Both carry terpineol, which smells pine, woody. The science ↓

Brown Soup Stock

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the beef and cut into ½-inch cubes.

  2. In a hot frying pan, brown one-fourth of the meat in the marrow from the marrow bone.

  3. Add cold water to the remaining meat and bone, and let it stand for 30 minutes.

Simmer

  1. Add the browned meat to the pot.

  2. Bring the mixture slowly to a boil, cover, and let it simmer for 7 hours.

  3. Add the vegetables and seasonings, and let it simmer for an additional hour.

Strain and finish

  1. Strain the stock and cool it.

  2. Remove the fat and clarify before serving.

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. Thyme + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  2. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Marjoram + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Releases flavor and gelatin into the stock during long simmering, giving body and savoriness.
Marrow
Adds rich fat and savory flavor when browned and rendered into the stock.
Onion
Contributes sweetness and savory depth as it softens and releases its flavor into the broth.
Carrot
Adds natural sweetness and aromatic depth to the stock.
Celery
Adds savory, herbal aroma that rounds out the stock's flavor.

The step that matters

Remove the fat and clarify before serving. Fat that is not skimmed stays on the surface and makes the stock greasy and cloudy. Cooling the stock lets fat solidify so it can be lifted off cleanly.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (carrot, turnip, thyme, celery, marjoram, parsley, beef):

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against carrot, turnip, thyme, celery, marjoram, parsley, 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.

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