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Mutton Broth

A clear broth made from mutton neck, pearl barley, salt, and water, simmered for two hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Mutton Broth

Why it works: Mutton and barley work together. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 510 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity. The science ↓

Mutton Broth

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Pick over the barley, wash it well in cold water, and soak it in hot water until needed.

Make the broth

  1. Cut the meat from the neck of mutton into small dice, place it in a pot with 2 quarts of cold water, and bring it slowly to a boil, skimming until clear.

  2. Add the soaked barley and season with salt.

  3. Let it simmer gently for 2 hours until the barley is soft.

  4. If necessary, remove the meat before serving the broth.

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. Mutton + barleytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together510 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Mutton neck
Gives the broth its meaty flavour and body as it simmers in the water.
Pearl barley
Softens during simmering, thickening the broth and adding a mild, starchy body.

The step that matters

Bringing the meat to a boil slowly while skimming. Starting in cold water and heating gradually lets proteins and impurities rise to the surface, where they can be skimmed off. This keeps the broth clear rather than cloudy and greasy.

“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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