Why it works: Carrot and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,873 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓
Hare Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the hare
Cut off the legs and shoulders of the hare and divide the body crossways.
Stew
Stew the hare gently in a gallon of water with ham or bacon, carrots, onions, cloves, mace, and sweet herbs until tender, about three hours.
Once tender, remove the meat from the back.
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.
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Carrot + clovetop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together5,873 recipes
Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
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Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together21,601 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Clove + macetop 6% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together8,400 recipes
Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).
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Onion + clovetop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together16,901 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).
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Carrot + macetop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,592 recipes
Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Hare
- Provides the main meat, which becomes tender through long, gentle stewing.
- Ham or bacon
- Adds savory, salty fat that flavors the broth during the long stew.
- Carrots
- Contribute sweetness and body to the broth as they cook down.
- Onions
- Add savory depth and aroma to the stewing liquid.
The step that matters
Stewing gently until tender. Gentle simmering breaks down the tough connective tissue in an old hare slowly, giving tender meat. Boiling hard can toughen the proteins and make the meat stringy, so the liquid should stay at a quiet simmer.
Swap the mace
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, carrot, onion, clove):
- Celeryfits better
- Thymefits better
- Allspicefits better
- Macethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against ham, carrot, onion, 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.
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