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Sheep-head Broth

A broth made by simmering a sheep's head with barley, peas, onions, carrot, turnip, parsley, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

Sheep-head Broth

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the head

  1. Soak the sheep's head in cold water with salt.

  2. Pour hot water over the head and add a handful of washing soda.

  3. Cover and let it sit for half an hour, then clean it with a knife.

  4. Soak the cleaned head in salt and water.

Make the broth

  1. Place the head in a pot and cover with cold water.

  2. Add barley, peas, onions, carrot, turnip, and parsley.

  3. Boil slowly for three hours.

Serve

  1. Serve the head spread out with trotters and slices of boiled carrot and turnip.

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 + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Barley + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together629 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Turnip + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,842 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Onion + turniptop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Sheep's head
Forms the main body of the broth, releasing collagen and flavour as it simmers slowly.
Barley
Thickens the broth as its starch releases during long simmering, giving body.
Peas
Break down during cooking, adding earthy sweetness and thickening the liquid slightly.
Onions
Soften and sweeten during simmering, adding savoury depth to the broth.

The step that matters

Boil slowly for three hours. A gentle simmer keeps the broth clear and lets collagen and connective tissue break down into tender meat. A hard boil makes the liquid cloudy and can toughen the meat.

Swap the peas

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

  1. Lentilsfits better
  2. Beansfits better
  3. Chickpeafits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against barley, onion, carrot, turnip, 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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