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Mutton Soup with Tapioca

A hearty soup made from mutton, bones, vegetables, and tapioca pearls.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,053 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Mutton Soup with Tapioca

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Combine mutton and bones with 2 quarts of cold water in a large pot.

  2. Heat slowly until boiling, then add 2 quarts of hot water from the kettle.

  3. Cook the mutton steadily for 5 hours with the pot lid on.

  4. Strain the soup into a large bowl and let it cool to skim off the fat.

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Chop the vegetables and cover them with cold water in a separate pot.

  2. Once the vegetables begin to simmer, discard the first water.

  3. Replenish the vegetable pot with hot water and cook until the vegetables are soft.

Finish the soup

  1. Return the strained soup to the pot, season with salt and pepper, and bring to a boil.

  2. Add the cooked vegetables and their liquid, heat together for 10 minutes, then strain again.

  3. Bring the soup to a slow boil before adding the tapioca.

  4. Soak the tapioca in cold water for 1 hour.

  5. Cook the soaked tapioca in boiling water until clear, stirring often.

  6. Gradually stir the tapioca into the soup until dissolved.

  7. Serve with grated cheese on the side.

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

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

  2. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

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

  5. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Mutton
Provides the main meaty flavor and richness as it cooks slowly into the broth.
Bones
Release gelatin and savory flavor into the broth during long, gentle simmering.
Tapioca
Thickens the soup as its starch swells and becomes clear when cooked.
Turnips
Add mild sweetness and body to the broth as they soften.
Carrots
Add natural sweetness and color to the broth as they soften.

The step that matters

Cook the mutton steadily for 5 hours with the pot lid on. A gentle, steady simmer keeps the broth clear while collagen from the bones and meat slowly breaks down into gelatin. A hard boil would emulsify fat into the liquid and make the soup cloudy and greasy.

Swap the tomato

The recipe marks tomato as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, onion, turnip, carrot, celery, parsley, pepper):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Parsnipfits better
  3. Okrafits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, onion, turnip, carrot, celery, parsley, 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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