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Shin of Beef Soup

A hearty soup made from beef shin, vegetables, barley, and a flour-thickening.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Turnip and leek match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,046 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Shin of Beef Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beef

  1. Have the butcher saw the shin bone into 2-inch pieces.

  2. Wash the meat in cold water.

  3. Mix salt and pepper, rub it into the meat, and place it in a soup pot.

  4. Add water equal to the weight of the meat in quarts and bring to a boil.

Simmer the soup

  1. Skim off any scum that rises, cover, and simmer gently for 2 hours.

  2. Skim again, then add the carrot, turnip, leek, parsley, potatoes, and barley.

  3. Cover and simmer gently for 1 hour.

  4. Mix the flour with water to make a thickening, stir it in, and cover for 15 minutes.

Serve

  1. Serve the soup hot, garnished with parsley, alongside mustard and catsup.

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. Turnip + leektop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,046 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

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

  3. Leek + barleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together142 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 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

Shin of beef
Slow simmering breaks down connective tissue, giving the broth body and tender meat.
Pearl barley
Swells as it cooks, adding body and thickening the soup.
Wheat flour
Mixed with water and stirred in, it thickens the broth to a lightly body-rich consistency.
Potatoes
Soften during simmering, adding starch that gives the soup substance.
Turnip
Becomes tender in the broth, adding mild sweetness and body.

The step that matters

Skimming the scum. Foam rising early in the boil contains impurities that cloud the broth and taste bitter if left in. Removing it keeps the soup clear and clean-flavoured.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pepper, carrot, turnip, leek, parsley, barley. 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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