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Restorative Broths

A hearty mutton broth with barley, vegetables, and seasonings, simmered for two hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Turnip and barley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 629 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Restorative Broths

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Break the bone of the mutton with a chopper.

  2. Put the mutton into a saucepan with water.

  3. Add salt, onion, turnip, celery, and pearl barley.

Simmer and strain

  1. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 2 hours.

  2. Skim the broth carefully and strain it.

Serve

  1. Serve the meat with parsley and butter or caper sauce.

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 + barleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together629 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Celery + barleytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together571 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol (clove, smoky).

  5. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Mutton scrag
Provides the meat and bone that flavour the broth as they simmer.
Pearl barley
Releases starch as it cooks, thickening the broth slightly and giving it body.
Onion
Adds savoury sweetness and aroma to the broth as it simmers.
Turnip
Contributes mild sweetness and vegetable flavour to the broth.

The step that matters

Skimming the broth. Fat and foam rise to the surface as the broth simmers. Skimming them off before straining keeps the broth clear and prevents it from tasting greasy.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, turnip, celery, barley):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Parsnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, turnip, celery, 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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