Name: On Soups and Broths
Ingredients: 1 lb beef, properly prepared and washed; 4 cups cold water; 2 young carrots; 1 onion with 2 cloves; 1 parsnip; a little celery; 1 bunch of thyme; 1 bunch of parsley; coarse sea salt to taste

Why it works: Thyme and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

On Soups and Broths

Ingredients

Directions

In a pot, combine the beef and cold water.
Bring to a simmer and cook for 5.5 to 6 hours.
When the liquid reduces, add the carrots, onion, parsnip, celery, thyme, and parsley.
Season with coarse sea salt to taste.

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.

Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together9,057 recipes

Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
Carrot + parsniptop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,097 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
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).
Parsnip + thymetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together270 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Beef: Releases flavour and gelatin into the water, giving the broth body and savoury depth.
Carrots: Add sweetness and aromatic flavour as they soften during the long simmer.
Onion: Contributes savoury, sweet aroma that deepens the broth's overall flavour.
Parsnip: Adds subtle sweetness and earthy body to the simmering liquid.

The step that matters

Keep the simmer gentle. A rolling boil emulsifies fat and clouds the broth, while a gentle simmer keeps it clear and lets collagen slowly release from the beef, giving body and flavour.

Swap the onion

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

Turnipfits better
Leekfits better
Shallotfits better
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, carrot, clove, parsnip, celery, thyme, parsley. 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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On Soups and Broths