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Mock Turtle Soup, of Calf's Head

A soup of calf's head, ham, herbs, and Madeira or sherry, served hot.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Mock Turtle Soup, of Calf's Head

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the calf's head

  1. Scald the calf's head.

  2. Remove the brain.

  3. Tie the head in a cloth.

  4. Boil for 1 hour until the meat slips from the bone.

  5. Remove the head.

  6. Save the broth.

  7. Cut the meat into small pieces.

  8. Place the meat in cold water.

  9. Put the meat in a stewpan.

  10. Cover the meat with some broth.

  11. Boil until tender.

  12. Set the meat aside.

Make the soup base

  1. Melt some butter in another stewpan.

  2. Add the ham.

  3. Add the fine herbs.

  4. Add the parsley.

  5. Add the onion.

  6. Pour in about 1 pint of the broth.

  7. Let it simmer for 2 hours.

  8. Dredge the mixture in a small quantity of flour.

  9. Add the remaining broth.

  10. Add the Madeira or sherry.

  11. Let it stew quietly for 10 minutes.

  12. Rub the mixture through a medium sieve.

Season and serve

  1. Add the calf's head pieces.

  2. Season with cayenne pepper.

  3. Season with coarse sea salt.

  4. Season with juice of 1 lemon.

  5. Season with pounded mace.

  6. Season with sugar.

  7. Add the prepared force meat balls.

  8. Serve hot after 5 minutes.

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. Parsley + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

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

  2. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Calf's head
Provides the meat and gelatinous body that gives the soup its rich texture.
Ham
Adds savoury, salty depth that flavours the broth.
Flour
Thickens the broth slightly so it has a fuller body.
Madeira or sherry
Adds wine acidity and aromatic sweetness to balance the rich broth.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the heavy, rich soup.
Onion
Builds aromatic sweetness and savoury base flavour in the broth.

The step that matters

Rub the mixture through a medium sieve. Pressing the simmered solids through a sieve removes fibres and small particles, giving the soup a smooth, even body rather than a grainy one.

Swap the mace

The recipe marks mace as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, parsley, onion, flour, sherry, pepper, lemon):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Celeryfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, parsley, onion, flour, sherry, pepper, lemon. 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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