Name: Beef Oe Mutton Soup
Ingredients: 4 quarts water; 2 tablespoons sifted bread crumbs; 3 pounds beef (cut in small pieces) or mutton chops (from the middle of the neck); pepper (to taste); coarse sea salt (to taste); 2 turnips (cut small); 2 carrots (cut small); 2 onions (cut small); 1 head of celery (cut small)

Why it works: Carrot and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Beef Oe Mutton Soup

Ingredients

4 quarts water
2 tablespoons sifted bread crumbs
3 pounds beef (cut in small pieces) or mutton chops (from the middle of the neck)
pepper (to taste)
coarse sea salt (to taste)
2 turnips (cut small)
2 carrots (cut small)
2 onions (cut small)
1 head of celery (cut small)

Directions

In a tightly covered saucepan, boil 4 quarts of water gently.
Add 2 tablespoons of sifted bread crumbs and 3 pounds of beef or mutton.
Season with pepper and coarse sea salt.
Add 2 small cut turnips, 2 small cut carrots, 2 small cut onions, and 1 small cut head of celery.
Let it stew for 4 hours until ready to 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.

Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together10,173 recipes

Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
Turnip + carrottop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together8,002 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Turnip + celerytop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,418 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together16,012 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Turnip + oniontop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together7,585 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

Beef or mutton: Provides the main meat flavor and body of the broth as it simmers.
Sifted bread crumbs: Thickens the broth slightly, giving it more body.
Turnips: Add mild sweetness and earthy flavor as they soften in the broth.
Carrots: Add sweetness and color to the broth as they cook down.
Onions: Build savory depth and aroma during the long simmer.

The step that matters

Let it stew for 4 hours. A long, gentle simmer below a boil breaks down the meat's connective tissue and draws flavor into the liquid. Boiling hard or stopping early leaves the meat tough and the broth thin.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, beef, pepper, turnip, carrot, celery):

Leekfits better
Parsnipfits better
Spinachfits about as well
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, beef, pepper, turnip, carrot, celery. 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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Beef Oe Mutton Soup