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A hearty soup made with meat, bones, vegetables, herbs, and spices, simmered slowly and strained.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,810 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Soups

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Fry the vegetables in a little butter for flavor.

  2. Cut the meat into pieces and crack the bones.

  3. Place meat and bones in a kettle and cover with 1 quart of cold water.

  4. Let it soak on low heat before cooking.

Simmer and finish

  1. Bring the soup to a slow boil, never hard.

  2. When done, strain through a sieve or coarse cloth without squeezing.

  3. If too thick, thin with water before using.

  4. Remove fat from the soup by letting it cool and lifting it off or skimming it off if hot.

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

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

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

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

  3. Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  4. Parsley + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Butter + meattop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,594 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Meat and bone
Provides the main flavor and body as it simmers into the broth.
Mixed vegetables
Add sweetness and aroma, deepened by frying in butter before simmering.
Butter
Carries fat-soluble flavor compounds from the vegetables when frying them.

The step that matters

Bring the soup to a slow boil, never hard.. A hard boil churns the broth and emulsifies fat into it, making the soup cloudy and greasy. A gentle simmer keeps it clear and easier to skim.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, parsley, butter, meat):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Sagefits about as well
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, parsley, butter, meat. 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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