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Parsnip Stew

A stew of salt pork, parsnips, and potatoes simmered until tender.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Pork and potato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,668 recipes. Both carry sotolon, which smells curry, maple. The science ↓

Parsnip Stew

Ingredients

Directions

Simmer the pork and parsnips

  1. Boil the salt pork for 1 hour or more.

  2. Add the parsnips to the pork.

  3. Boil for another 30 minutes.

Add the potatoes and finish

  1. Add the potatoes.

  2. Cook until they are done.

  3. Reduce the water to about 1 pint before serving.

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. Pork + potatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  2. Parsnip + potatotop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together353 recipes

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

  3. Pork + parsniptop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together306 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

Salt pork
Adds fat and savory seasoning that flavors the whole broth.
Parsnips
Add sweetness and earthy flavor, and soften into tender pieces during simmering.
Potatoes
Their starch softens and slightly thickens the broth as they cook.

The step that matters

Cooking the potatoes until just done. Potato starch breaks down when overcooked, making the potatoes mushy and the broth cloudier and heavier. Testing for tenderness often and stopping once they yield to a fork keeps the pieces intact.

Swap the parsnip

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

  1. Onionfits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Tomatofits better
  4. Parsnipthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, 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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