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Mutton, Rice, and Tomato Broth

A broth of mutton, rice, and tomatoes simmered with sugar, salt, pepper, and thickened with corn starch.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Rice and corn match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 933 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Mutton, Rice, and Tomato Broth

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the broth

  1. Skim the fat from the surface of the mutton broth.

  2. Add the cracked bones of the cold mutton to the broth and boil slowly for 1.5 hours.

  3. Strain the broth and cool it to remove the fat.

Make the soup

  1. Put the broth back on the fire and add the tomatoes and rice.

  2. Stew for 40 minutes.

  3. Add the sugar, salt, and pepper to taste.

  4. Mix the corn starch with cold water and add it to the broth.

  5. Boil for 1 minute and then pour out.

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. Rice + corntop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together933 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  2. Tomato + corntop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,099 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Tomato + ricetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,065 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + corntop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,324 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Ripe tomatoes
Break down during stewing to give the soup body, acidity and a fresh tomato flavour.
Raw rice
Releases starch as it simmers, thickening the broth and giving it a soft, heartier texture.
Corn starch
Thickens the broth when boiled briefly, giving it a smoother, more clinging body.
Fat from mutton broth
Adds richness and carries flavour; it is skimmed off so the finished soup is less greasy.

The step that matters

Boil the corn starch mixture briefly. Cornstarch must be mixed with cold water before it goes in, so it does not clump, and then boiled to fully activate its thickening. Stopping too early leaves the soup thin and starchy-tasting.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, rice, sugar, pepper, corn):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Carrotfits about as well
  3. Asparagusfits about as well
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, rice, sugar, pepper, corn. 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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