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Beef and Vegetable Soup

A hearty soup made with beef, carrots, turnip, onion, celery, rice, tomatoes, and herbs, simmered for two 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 ↓

Beef and Vegetable Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Break any bones on hand and place them in the bottom of a soup kettle.

  2. Cut the meat into half-inch dice and add it on top of the bones.

  3. Pour in four quarts of cold water and bring to a slow boil.

  4. Skim the surface carefully until the soup is clear.

  5. Wash the rice in a colander under cold water.

  6. Peel and dice the vegetables into quarter-inch pieces. Chop the celery.

Simmer and serve

  1. Once the soup is clear, add the vegetables, rice, salt, pepper, and bouquet of herbs.

  2. Let the soup simmer steadily for two hours, adding boiling water as needed to maintain four quarts. Check the seasoning.

  3. Serve in a soup tureen, removing all bones before serving.

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Celery + tomatotop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 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

Soup meat
Provides rich beef flavor and body as it simmers slowly in the broth.
Rice
Thickens the soup slightly and absorbs some of the broth as it cooks.
Tomatoes
Add acidity and a deeper, savory flavor to the broth.
Carrot
Adds natural sweetness and holds its shape through long simmering.
Onion
Builds savory aroma and depth as it softens in the broth.

The step that matters

Skimming the surface until the soup is clear. Skimming removes foam and coagulated proteins that rise during the first boil. Removing them early keeps the broth clear and free of off flavors.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Okrafits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against carrot, turnip, celery, meat, rice, tomato, 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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