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Clear Light Broth, or First Stock

A clear broth made by simmering veal, beef, lamb, or mutton trimmings with vegetables and herbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme 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 ↓

Clear Light Broth, or First Stock

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. Cut the meat and bones into pieces.

  2. Rub butter over the bottom of a large stewpan.

  3. Add the meat, onions, carrots, turnips, and celery to the stewpan.

Make the broth

  1. Pour in 1 quart of water and place over high heat.

  2. Cover and cook until a light white glaze forms on the bottom, stirring occasionally.

  3. Fill the stewpan with 7 gallons of cold water and bring to a boil.

  4. Reduce heat and add parsley, thyme, and bay leaves.

  5. Let it simmer for 3 hours, skimming regularly.

Strain

  1. Strain through a cloth and use as needed.

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. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

Veal, beef, lamb, or mutton trimmings
Provide the meat, bones and collagen that give the broth its body and flavor.
Onions
Add sweetness and savory aroma as they cook down into the broth.
Celery
Adds aromatic vegetal flavor that rounds out the broth.
Carrots
Add gentle sweetness and color to the broth.

The step that matters

Cover and cook until a light white glaze forms. Browning or overcooking the meat and vegetables at this stage can make the broth dark and bitter. Cooking gently until only a pale glaze forms keeps the broth clear and clean-tasting.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, butter, carrot, turnip, celery, parsley, thyme):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, butter, carrot, turnip, celery, parsley, thyme. 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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