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White Stock

A clear veal stock made by simmering veal knuckle with vegetables, herbs, and spices in cold water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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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 ↓

White Stock

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a large pot, combine the veal and cold water.

  2. Add salt, carrot, onion, celery, peppercorns, mace, bay leaf, parsley, thyme, and marjoram.

  3. Bring to a boil and simmer for 2 hours.

  4. Strain the stock and discard the solids.

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

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  2. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Parsley + marjoramtop 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

Knuckle of veal
Releases gelatin and collagen into the water, giving the stock body and a rich mouthfeel.
Onion
Adds savory sweetness and color to the stock as it simmers.
Carrot
Contributes gentle sweetness and aromatic depth to the broth.
Celery
Adds a fresh, vegetal aroma that rounds out the flavor of the stock.

The step that matters

Keep the simmer gentle. Boiling hard emulsifies fat and clouds the stock, while a gentle simmer lets proteins and fat rise and be skimmed off, keeping the broth clear.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Winter savoryfits better
  2. Sagefits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Macethe original

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