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Scotch Broth

A hearty beef and barley soup with cabbage, leeks, turnip, carrot, and peas.

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

Why it works: Leek and turnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,046 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Scotch Broth

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Put the barley into a stewpan with 6 quarts of cold water and heat.

  2. Prepare the vegetables: soak the cabbage, leeks, and turnip in cold water until needed, then drain.

  3. Grate the carrot without adding cold water to preserve its flavor.

Simmer

  1. When the water boils, add all the vegetables, beef, pepper, and salt.

  2. Simmer gently until the beef is tender, skimming the broth carefully.

Serve

  1. Serve the beef on a separate dish and the broth with vegetables and barley in a tureen.

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. Leek + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,046 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Barley + leektop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together142 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Turnip + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Cabbage + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together897 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Barley + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together629 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Its connective tissue breaks down during slow simmering, becoming tender and enriching the broth.
Pearl barley
Releases starch as it cooks, thickening the broth and giving it a chewy body.
Peas
Dried peas soften and break down during cooking, adding body and thickening the broth.
Leeks
Contribute a mild onion-like sweetness and aroma to the broth.
Carrot
Adds natural sweetness and color to the broth.

The step that matters

Simmer gently, not at a rolling boil. A gentle simmer lets the beef tenderise slowly as its connective tissue softens, while a hard boil toughens the meat and makes the broth cloudy and greasy. Careful skimming removes foam and fat, keeping the broth clear.

Swap the peas

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, barley, cabbage, leek, turnip, carrot, pepper):

  1. Lentilsfits better
  2. Beansfits better
  3. Chestnutfits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, barley, cabbage, leek, turnip, carrot, 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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