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Kilkenny Soup

A hearty Irish soup made with beef, mutton, ham, vegetables, oatmeal, and potatoes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and turnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,002 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Kilkenny Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the stock

  1. Crack the bones.

  2. Cut the meat into strips.

  3. Cover the meat with cold water.

  4. Bring to a boil slowly.

  5. Boil for 1 hour.

  6. Skim off the top.

  7. Add the browned onions, sliced vegetables, and herbs.

  8. Cook for 3 more hours.

  9. Strain the soup.

Prepare the meat and stock

  1. Season the meat with salt and pepper.

  2. Pour half of the clear stock over the meat in a jar or bowl.

  3. Set aside to cool.

  4. Rub the vegetables through a colander into the remaining stock.

  5. Cool the mixture.

  6. Remove the fat.

  7. Season the stock.

Finish and serve

  1. Add the sliced potatoes and oatmeal.

  2. Cook for 1 more hour.

  3. Strain into a tureen.

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 + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Onion + potatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  3. Carrot + potatotop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,107 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  4. Onion + turniptop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

Lean beef
Gives the stock its meaty flavor and body as it cooks for hours.
Scrag of mutton
Bones and meat release gelatin and richness into the broth.
Irish oatmeal
Soaked oats thicken the soup slightly and add a soft, body-giving texture.
Potatoes
Add starch and bulk, making the soup heartier.

The step that matters

Skim off the top. Foam and fat rising early in the boil cloud the stock and taste greasy, so removing them keeps the broth clear and clean-flavored.

Swap the turnip

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, mutton, ham, onion, carrot, pepper, potato):

  1. Leekfits about as well
  2. Tomatofits about as well
  3. Turnipthe original
  4. Capsicumfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, mutton, ham, onion, carrot, pepper, potato. 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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