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Clear Soup

A clear beef broth made with shank, tomatoes, celery, mace, herbs, and clarified with egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Clear Soup

Why it works: Tomato and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,377 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Clear Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the stock

  1. Split the bones of the beef shank and slightly roast the meat.

  2. Add the beef shank to 6 quarts of water, tomatoes, chopped celery, mace, and soup herbs.

  3. Boil for 6 to 8 hours.

  4. Strain the soup through a colander and set aside until the next day.

Clear and finish

  1. Once cold, remove all grease.

  2. Reheat the soup until warm, then clear it with the beaten egg whites.

  3. Before serving, add red pepper and adjust color with burnt sugar or Tournades if necessary.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  4. Beef + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,448 recipes

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

  5. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 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

Beef shank
Gives the stock its beefy flavour and body as it simmers for hours.
Egg whites
Coagulate as they heat, trapping cloudy particles so the soup clears.
Tomatoes
Add acidity and savoury depth to the long-simmered stock.
Celery
Contributes aromatic vegetable flavour to the stock during the long boil.

The step that matters

Clearing with egg whites. Reheat gently rather than boiling hard. Egg whites must be stirred in and left to heat slowly so they coagulate and collect cloudy particles; vigorous boiling can break up the raft and leave the soup murky.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, tomato, celery, egg, pepper, sugar):

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Oreganofits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, tomato, celery, egg, pepper, sugar. 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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