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Scotch Broth

A hearty soup of mutton, barley, and vegetables simmered in broth.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Scotch Broth

Why it works: Carrot and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Scotch Broth

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Pick over the barley and soak it overnight or for several hours in cold water.

  2. Wipe the mutton with a clean wet cloth. Remove the fat and skin from the mutton. Cut the mutton into half-inch dice.

  3. Cut the carrot, turnip, onion, and celery into half-inch dice.

Make the broth

  1. Put the bones in 1 pint of cold water and bring to a boil.

  2. Put the diced mutton in 1 quart of cold water and bring to a boil.

  3. Let the mutton boil quickly for 20 minutes, then skim off the fat.

  4. Add the soaked barley to the pot.

  5. Fry the diced vegetables in 1 tablespoon of butter for 5 minutes. Add the fried vegetables to the pot.

  6. Simmer the broth for 3 to 4 hours, or until the meat and barley are tender.

Finish

  1. Strain the water from the bones.

  2. In a saucepan, cook 1 tablespoon of butter with 1 tablespoon of flour until smooth. Gradually add the strained water to the saucepan and stir into the broth.

  3. Add the salt, white pepper, and chopped parsley. Simmer for 10 minutes.

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.

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.

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

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  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 + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Turnip + oniontop 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

Pearl barley
Swells as it simmers, thickening the broth and giving it body.
Neck of mutton
Gives the broth its meaty flavour and, as it cooks, tender texture.
Flour
Cooked with butter to form a roux that thickens the broth smoothly.
Butter or dripping
Fat that carries flavour when frying the vegetables and making the roux.
Onion
Softens and sweetens during frying and simmering, adding aromatic depth.
Carrot
Softens and adds subtle sweetness to the broth.

The step that matters

Adding the flour and butter roux to the broth. Flour must be cooked in butter until smooth before the liquid is added, and the strained water should be added gradually while stirring. This prevents lumps and lets the flour thicken the broth evenly.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (barley, mutton, carrot, turnip, celery, butter, flour):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against barley, mutton, carrot, turnip, celery, butter, flour. 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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