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Brown Consomme

A clear brown consommé made from beef, veal, vegetables, and spices, simmered for several hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Brown Consomme

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the meat into small pieces, less than 1 inch square.

  2. Heat half the butter in a frying pan and fry the vegetables until browned.

  3. Strain the vegetables and set aside in a colander.

Brown the meat

  1. Add the remaining butter to a soup kettle and heat.

  2. Add the meat to the hot butter, stirring to coat and brown without scorching.

  3. Remove from heat and cover with cold water.

Simmer

  1. Return to the stove and simmer slowly for 1 hour after it starts to smoke.

  2. Add 1 gallon more cold water, bring to a boil slowly, cover, and simmer for at least 5 hours.

  3. After 4 hours, add the browned vegetables and spices.

  4. After 6 hours, you should have about 3 quarts of strong brown stock.

Strain and clarify

  1. Let the liquid cool before removing the meat and vegetables, but do not wait for the fat to harden.

  2. Strain the stock through a colander, return to heat, and add salt.

  3. Bring to a hard boil, skim off the scum, and strain again through a coarse cloth.

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. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Celery + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  4. Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

  5. Allspice + parsleytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,289 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Breaks down during long simmering, releasing gelatin and rich meaty flavor into the stock.
Veal
Adds gelatin and body, giving the stock a fuller mouthfeel with a mild flavor.
Butter
Carries flavor and promotes browning of the meat and vegetables in the pan.
Onion
Browning builds sweet, savory depth that colors and flavors the finished stock.
Kitchen bouquet
Deepens the brown color of the stock.

The step that matters

Keep the stock at a gentle simmer. Vigorous boiling emulsifies fat and breaks up solids into the liquid, clouding the stock. A slow simmer lets fat and impurities rise and collect so they can be skimmed and strained out.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, veal, celery, carrot, clove, allspice, parsley):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, veal, celery, carrot, clove, allspice, parsley. 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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