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Ox-Head Soup

A clear broth made from ox cheek simmered with celery, turnip, carrots, onions, spices, and herbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,979 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Ox-Head Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cheek

  1. Soak the ox cheek in cold water for 2 hours.

  2. Remove the cheek.

  3. Break any unbroken bones.

  4. Wash the cheek in lukewarm water.

Make the soup

  1. Place the cheek in a pot and cover the pot with cold water.

  2. Bring the pot to a boil and skim off any scum.

  3. Add salt, celery, turnip, carrots, onions, peppercorns, allspice, parsley, marjoram, savory, and lemon thyme.

  4. Cover the pot and simmer on low heat for 3 hours.

  5. Remove the cheek.

Strain and chill

  1. Strain the soup through a fine sieve into a stoneware pan.

  2. Let the soup cool overnight.

  3. Cut the meat into small pieces.

  4. Skim off any fat from the top.

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 + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

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

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

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

  4. Celery + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  5. Marjoram + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together957 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Ox cheek
Provides the meat and collagen that enrich the broth as it simmers.
Celery
Adds savory, aromatic flavour to the broth as it simmers.
Onions
Contribute sweetness and savoury depth to the broth as they cook down.
Carrots
Add natural sweetness and body to the broth during the long simmer.
Turnip
Adds a mild, slightly sweet earthiness to the broth.

The step that matters

Skim off any scum. Scum rises as proteins coagulate when the liquid first heats. Removing it keeps the broth clear and prevents a bitter, cloudy flavour from dispersing into the soup.

Swap the onion

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

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

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