Name: Soup Stock
Ingredients: 1 shin of beef; 5 quarts cold water; 1 onion; 1 carrot; 2 bay leaves; 1 sprig parsley; 12 cloves; 1 stalk celery; 1 tablespoon salt

Why it works: Carrot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,053 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Soup Stock

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Wipe the meat well with a damp towel.
Cut all the meat from the bones.
Place the bones in a large kettle and lay the meat on top.
Add the cold water.

Simmer

Stand the kettle on the back of the stove for 1 hour.
Move the kettle to a good fire for about 80 minutes until scum forms on the surface.
Add 1 cup of cold water.
Skim off the scum.
Cover the kettle.
Let it simmer (not boil) for 4 hours.
Add the vegetables.
Simmer for 1 hour longer.

Strain and cool

Strain the stock through a fine sieve.
Add the salt.
Cool it in a cold place.
Once cold, remove all the grease from the surface.

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.

Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together8,053 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together10,173 recipes

Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
Parsley + celerytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together6,810 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Carrot + clovetop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,873 recipes

Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
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

Shin of beef: Releases gelatin and savory flavor into the stock as it simmers slowly.
Beef bones: Provide collagen that turns into gelatin, giving body to the finished stock.
Cold water: Extracts flavor and gelatin from meat and bones when heated gradually.
Onion: Adds aromatic sweetness and depth to the stock's flavor.
Carrot: Adds subtle sweetness and aroma to the stock.

The step that matters

Skim off the scum. Scum is coagulated protein and impurities that rise as the stock heats. Removing it keeps the stock clear and clean-tasting.

Swap the clove

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

Thymefits better
Marjoramfits better
Cuminfits better
Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, onion, carrot, parsley, celery. 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.