Skip to main content
Main

Mock Turtle Soup

A soup made from calf head, liver, haslet, brains, and spices, thickened and served with hard‑boiled eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Gibson, Marietta Fauntleroy Hollyday, "Mrs. C. H. Gibson." · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Allspice and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Mock Turtle Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup

  1. Parboil a calf's head, scrape the hair off, split it open and take out the brains.

  2. Put the head back in the pot with one and a half gallons of water.

  3. Add liver and haslet, a bunch of thyme, and a large slice of middling.

  4. Let it boil until the bones come out.

  5. Take the bones out and season the soup to taste.

  6. Add one tablespoonful of allspice, a good pinch of cloves, the same of mace, four tablespoonsful of pounded pepper and salt.

  7. Thicken the soup.

  8. Slice the head and liver, put them back in and let it simmer until done.

  9. Fry the brains in butter and add them to the soup.

Garnish and serve

  1. Boil hard eggs.

  2. Cut the yolks into small pieces.

  3. Put one yolk to each plateful.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

22Calories
0 gProtein
1 gFat
5 gCarbs

Counts 5 of 7 ingredients. The other 2 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 5 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Clove1 tsp ground (2g)7
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Allspice1 tsp ground (1.9g)5
Thyme1 tsp dried (1.4g)4
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Waternot in our table0
Macenot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Gibson, Marietta Fauntleroy Hollyday, "Mrs. C. H. Gibson.". 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. See the original page.

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. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Allspice + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,077 recipes

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

  3. Thyme + clovetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,108 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Thyme + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

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

  5. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

What each ingredient does

Calf's head (in the method)
Provides gelatin and body, giving the soup its rich, thick texture as the bones cook down.
Brains (in the method)
Fried in butter, they add a rich, creamy texture to the finished soup.
Eggs (in the method)
Hard-boiled yolks add a crumbly, rich garnish that contrasts with the soup.
Pepper
Adds sharp heat and aroma that give the soup its characteristic seasoned bite.

The step that matters

Let it boil until the bones come out. Long, steady simmering is needed to draw gelatin and flavour from the bones; boiling too hard can cloud the broth and toughen the meat.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (allspice, thyme, clove, pepper):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against allspice, thyme, clove, pepper. 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.

You might also like

Tomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesMutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipesYorkshire PuddingYorkshire Pudding264 recipes