Why it works: Clove and berry share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and 22 recipes mention both. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓
The recipe
Ingredients
Contains: milk (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)
Directions
Prepare the broth
Prepare and cook beef same as for Bouillon.
Cook vegetables in butter five minutes; then add to soup with remaining seasonings.
Cook one and one-half hours, strain, cool quickly, remove fat, and clear.
Finish and serve
When ready to clear, add one cup finely chopped raw beet and one-fourth cup vinegar.
Select red beets for this soup, and serve as soon as possible after clearing, otherwise it will lose its bright red color, which makes the dish especially appropriate for an American Beauty Dinner.
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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.
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Clove + berrytop 5% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together22 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).
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Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together7,711 recipes
Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
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Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together10,172 recipes
Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
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Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together8,053 recipes
Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
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Parsley + celerytop 2% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together6,805 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Shin of beef
- Provides rich meat flavor and body to the broth as it simmers.
- Beet
- Supplies the red color and earthy sweetness that define the soup.
- Butter
- Carries the flavor of the cooked vegetables into the soup as they soften.
- Vinegar (in the method)
- Adds acidity that brightens the flavor and helps keep the beet color vivid.
- Carrot
- Adds gentle sweetness and body as it cooks down into the broth.
The step that matters
Serve soon after clearing. Beet pigments fade over time once the soup is cooked and held, so the bright red color is lost if it waits too long before serving.
Flavor stand-ins for the berry
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, carrot, onion, clove, allspice, parsley, celery):
- Lemonbetter flavor fit
- Limebetter flavor fit
- Orangebetter flavor fit
- Berrythe original
Fit is the average pairing score against beef, carrot, onion, clove, allspice, parsley, celery. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).
“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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