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Ox-Cheek Soup

A hearty soup made from ox cheek meat, onions, herbs, rice, and curry, simmered with bones and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Ox-Cheek Soup

Why it works: Onion and rice are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,433 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Ox-Cheek Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the meat very small.

  2. Fry the onions until brown.

Make the broth

  1. Put the meat, fried onions, and bones into a pot.

  2. Pour in the water and stew slowly for three hours.

  3. Strain the broth.

  4. Cool the broth.

  5. Skim the broth.

Finish and serve

  1. Add seasoning, herbs, and rice (previously soaked for two hours).

  2. Stew for half an hour.

  3. Add the curry powder mixed with cold water.

  4. Boil and serve.

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. Onion + ricetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,433 recipes

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

  2. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Rice + peppertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,379 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Meat + ricetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,481 recipes

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

  5. Meat + oniontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,364 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Meat from the cheeks of an ox-head
Gives the soup its rich, savoury body and tender texture after slow stewing.
Bones of the head
Release gelatin and flavour into the water during long stewing, adding body to the broth.
2 sliced onions
Browning them first builds a deeper, sweeter savoury flavour in the broth.
1 small cup of rice
Thickens the soup slightly as its starch is released during the final stew.
1 teaspoon curry powder
Adds warm aromatic spice that flavours the finished broth.

The step that matters

Skim the broth before adding the rice and seasoning. After long stewing, fat and impurities rise to the surface. Removing them before the final stew keeps the broth clean and less greasy.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, rice, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, rice, pepper. 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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