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Ox-Tail Soup

A hearty soup made with ox tail, lean beef, carrots, onions, thyme, and seasoned with pepper and sea salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,563 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Ox-Tail Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the ox tail into several pieces.

  2. Fry the pieces until brown in butter.

  3. Slice the onions and carrots.

  4. Brown the sliced onions and carrots in the same pan after removing the ox tail.

  5. Tie the onions, carrots, and thyme in a bag.

  6. Add the bag to the soup pot.

  7. Add the pieces of ox tail and the sliced beef to the pot.

  8. Grate the two whole carrots over the mixture.

  9. Add 4 quarts of cold water.

  10. Season with pepper and coarse sea salt.

Simmer and finish

  1. Boil for 4 to 6 hours, depending on the size of the tail.

  2. Strain the soup 15 minutes before serving.

  3. Thicken with 2 tablespoons of browned flour.

  4. Boil for an additional 10 minutes.

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. Carrot + thymetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Thyme + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 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

Ox tail
Releases collagen and rich flavour into the broth during long simmering.
Lean beef
Adds meaty flavour and body to the soup.
Onions
Browning adds sweetness and savoury depth to the broth.
Carrots
Browning and simmering add sweetness and earthy aroma.
Browned flour (in the method)
Thickens the broth and adds a toasted, nutty flavour.

The step that matters

Browning the ox tail in butter. Searing creates browned, caramelised surfaces through the Maillard reaction, which builds the deep flavour of the finished broth. Pale meat yields a flatter, less complex soup.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, carrot, thyme, butter, pepper):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Parsnipfits better
  3. Leekfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, carrot, thyme, butter, 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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