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Scotch Soup

A hearty beef or veal soup with pearl barley, vegetables, and herbs, simmered slowly in water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Scotch Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup

  1. Place the beef or veal in a large pot and cover with cold water.

  2. Add the pearl barley and simmer gently for 1 hour, skimming off any scum that rises.

  3. Once the scum has cleared, add the parsley, thyme, bay leaf, celery, onions, turnips, pepper, and salt.

  4. Gradually add another quart of water and continue to simmer until the vegetables are tender.

Serve

  1. Remove the meat and serve it on a separate dish.

  2. Serve the soup hot without straining.

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. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Parsley + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Celery + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Parsley + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,842 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

Shin of beef or knuckle of veal
Gives the broth body and rich meaty flavour as it simmers.
Pearl barley
Thickens the soup slightly and adds a chewy, starchy texture.
Turnips
Add mild sweetness and soften into the soup as it simmers.
Onions
Add savoury depth and sweetness to the broth as they cook.

The step that matters

Skimming the scum. Skimming the grey foam that rises during the first simmer keeps the broth clear and clean-tasting. Skim before adding the vegetables so the scum is removed while it is easy to lift off.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, meat, barley, parsley, thyme, celery, turnip):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, meat, barley, parsley, thyme, celery, turnip. 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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