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Soup

Beef Tea

A clear beef broth made by simmering beef, onion, garlic clove, and herbs in water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Beef Tea

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the beef into small pieces.

  2. Place the beef in a pot with water.

  3. Add the onion, clove, and herbs.

Simmer and serve

  1. Simmer for 3 to 4 hours or leave in the oven overnight.

  2. Strain the liquid and serve.

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. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  2. Onion + clovetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,901 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  3. Beef + clovetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Slowly breaks down its connective tissue into gelatin, giving the broth body and savory flavor.
Onion
Adds savory sweetness and aroma as it softens in the simmering liquid.
Clove
Adds a warm, spicy aroma to the broth.
Sweet herbs
Add aromatic flavor that infuses the broth during simmering.

The step that matters

Keep the simmer gentle. Holding the liquid at a slow simmer rather than a hard boil extracts flavor from the beef and onion while keeping the broth clear and free of cloudy, emulsified fat.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Cuminfits better
  3. Celeryfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, onion. 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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