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Soup

White Stock

A clear broth made by simmering veal, fowl, vegetables, and spices in cold water for six hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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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 ↓

White Stock

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine the veal, fowl, carrot, onion, celery, turnip, peppercorns, mace, marrow bone, salt, and cold water in a large pot. Bring to a gentle simmer over low heat.

  2. Cook for 6 hours, skimming off any impurities that rise to the surface.

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 + 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. Celery + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Knuckle of veal
Provides collagen and gelatin that give the stock body and a silky mouthfeel as it simmers.
Fowl
Adds additional savory flavor and gelatin to the stock during the long simmer.
Marrow bone
Releases fat and gelatin into the liquid, adding richness and body.
Onion
Contributes sweet, aromatic flavor that deepens as the stock simmers.

The step that matters

Keep the simmer gentle and skim impurities. A rolling boil emulsifies fat and impurities into the liquid, making the stock cloudy and greasy. A gentle simmer with regular skimming keeps the stock clear and clean-tasting.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, carrot, onion, celery, turnip. 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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