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Consomme

A clear soup made from boiled fowl stock, vegetables, and spices, strained and skimmed.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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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 ↓

Consomme

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Melt the butter in a frying pan.

  2. Add the minced onion, carrot, and celery.

  3. Cook slowly for 20 minutes, stirring until lightly browned.

Make the consommé

  1. Add the hot water from the boiled fowl.

  2. Tie the spices in a netting bag and add the bag to the soup.

  3. Boil slowly for 1 hour, then add salt.

Strain, chill and serve

  1. Strain through a cloth, then cool.

  2. Skim off the fat when cold.

  3. Reheat to serve.

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. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

  4. Sage + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,445 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 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

Butter
Carries flavour and helps the vegetables brown, adding richness to the broth.
Onion
Softens and browns, adding sweetness and savoury depth to the base.
Carrot
Cooks down slowly, adding gentle sweetness to the broth.
Celery
Adds aromatic, savoury depth to the base.
Hot water from boiled fowl
Serves as the liquid base, drawing flavour from the bird and vegetables.

The step that matters

Boil slowly for 1 hour. A gentle simmer keeps the consommé clear. Vigorous boiling breaks up fat and proteins into the liquid, making it cloudy.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, carrot, celery, pepper, sage, parsley, clove):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, carrot, celery, pepper, sage, parsley, clove. 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.

More consommé recipes

Chicken 21Veal 18Soup 15Vegetable 11Rice 8Custard 7 See all 50 →

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