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Pepper Pot

A hearty soup made with tripe, ox feet, potatoes, onions, herbs, and dumplings, seasoned with pepper and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and potato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Pepper Pot

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the tripe and broth

  1. Place the tripe and ox feet in a large pot and cover with water.

  2. Add whole pepper and a little coarse sea salt.

  3. Bring to a boil over medium heat, then reduce to a simmer, keeping the pot covered.

  4. Once the tripe is tender and the ox feet are falling apart, remove them from the pot.

  5. Skim the liquid and strain it.

  6. Cut the tripe into small pieces and return it to the pot with the strained liquid.

Build the soup and serve

  1. Add chopped sweet herbs, sliced onions, and sliced potatoes.

  2. Make small dumplings by mixing flour and butter, then season the vegetables with pepper and salt.

  3. Pour in enough boiling water to cover the ingredients without diluting the flavor.

  4. Add a large piece of butter rolled in flour and the dumplings.

  5. Boil until all ingredients are thoroughly cooked, then serve in 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. Onion + potatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Tripe
Becomes tender through long simmering, giving the soup its body and chewy texture.
Ox feet
Release gelatin into the broth, adding body and a rich, silky mouthfeel.
Potatoes
Break down slightly as they cook, thickening the broth and adding starchy body.
Flour
Forms the dumpling dough and thickens the broth as it cooks.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, carrying flavor and giving the dumplings tenderness.

The step that matters

Simmering the tripe and ox feet gently. A hard boil toughens the proteins in tripe and can leave the broth cloudy, while slow simmering breaks down collagen into gelatin, making the meat tender and the broth rich.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, potato, flour, butter):

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Spinachfits better
  3. Capsicumfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, potato, flour, butter. 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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