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White Stock

A clear stock made by simmering veal knuckle or whole chicken with herbs, salt, peppercorns, onion, celery, turnip, carrot, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and carrot 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 ↓

White Stock

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Place the knuckle of veal or chicken in a large pot.

  2. Add the herbs, salt, peppercorns, onion, celery, turnip, carrot, and water.

  3. Bring to a boil.

  4. Reduce heat and simmer for several hours, skimming off any foam that rises to the surface.

  5. Strain the stock through a fine sieve and discard 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. Celery + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Turnip + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Celery + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Onion + turniptop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Veal knuckle or chicken
Provides collagen and flavor that give the stock body and savoriness as it simmers.
Onion
Adds sweetness and aromatic depth to the stock.
Carrot
Adds subtle sweetness and color to the stock.
Celery
Adds savory, aromatic flavor to the stock.

The step that matters

Skimming the foam. Foam is coagulated protein and impurities that rise during simmering. Skimming it keeps the stock clear and prevents off-flavors from returning into the liquid.

Swap the onion

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, celery, turnip, carrot. 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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