Why it works: Beef and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓
Soup Stock
Ingredients
Directions
Place the beef in a large pot with the cold water.
Bring the water to a boil slowly without adding salt.
Skim the surface to remove scum before it breaks up.
Add salt and a dash of cold water to help the scum rise, then skim again.
Reduce heat and let it simmer gently for 6 to 8 hours until the meat is falling apart.
Add a little pepper, then strain the stock into a container.
Let it cool and remove all the grease.
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.
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Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together18,971 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
- Lean beef
- Provides the meat, collagen and flavor that give the stock its body and savoriness.
- Cold water
- Extracts flavor and gelatin from the beef as it heats slowly.
- Salt
- Seasons the stock and, with a dash of cold water, helps scum rise for skimming.
The step that matters
Bring the water to a boil slowly and skim the scum. Starting cold and heating gradually lets impurities coagulate and rise as scum, which is skimmed off. Boiling hard early breaks the scum up into the liquid, leaving the stock 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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