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Family Soup

A hearty soup made from beef bones, liver, ham, mutton, turnip, celery, onion, herbs, and rice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Turnip and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,418 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Family Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the liver in salted water for 1 hour before slicing.

  2. In a soup pot, combine the beef bones, minced meat, and chopped vegetables.

Simmer the stock

  1. Cover with cold water and bring to a boil.

  2. Reduce heat and simmer very slowly for 5 hours.

  3. Strain the soup, pressing hard to extract flavors, and cool to remove fat.

Finish and serve

  1. Season the soup and return it to the heat.

  2. When boiling, stir in the previously cooked rice.

  3. Simmer together for 30 minutes and serve.

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. Turnip + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Turnip + oniontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

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

  4. Celery + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Celery + ricetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,169 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

Beef bones
Release gelatin and savory flavor into the long-simmered broth, giving body and depth.
Calf's liver
Adds a rich, mineral-like depth and a slightly dense texture to the soup.
Coarse mutton
Contributes meaty flavor and fat that is later skimmed off, enriching the broth.
Raw rice
Thickens the soup slightly as its starch cooks into the broth.
Onion
Provides sweetness and aromatic flavor as it cooks slowly into the stock.
Celery
Adds aromatic, savory flavor to the broth as it simmers.

The step that matters

Cool the strained soup to remove fat. Fat that is left in the soup stays liquid while hot and floats on top. Cooling lets it solidify so it can be lifted off cleanly, leaving a lighter, clearer broth.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, liver, ham, mutton, turnip, onion, rice):

  1. Celerythe original
  2. Capersfits about as well
  3. Thymefits about as well
  4. Garlicfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, liver, ham, mutton, turnip, onion, rice. 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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