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Beef Soup

A hearty beef broth with onions, carrots, potatoes, and optional dumplings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

Beef Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. In a large pot, boil the hock of beef for 4-5 hours.

  2. Once the scum has been removed, add the whole onions.

Finish the soup

  1. When the soup is nearly done, cut the meat from the bone into small pieces and return to the pot.

  2. Season with salt, pepper, and sweet herbs.

  3. Add the sliced carrots and potatoes.

  4. For dumplings, mix part potato with flour, shape them small, and boil for 15-20 minutes.

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

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

  3. Pepper + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

  4. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

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

Hock of beef
Long simmering releases flavour and gelatin into the broth, giving the soup body.
Whole onions
Release sweetness and aromatic depth into the broth as they cook.
Carrots
Add natural sweetness and a firm texture that holds up during simmering.
Potatoes
Soften as they cook, thickening the broth slightly and adding starchy body.

The step that matters

Removing the scum. Scum is coagulated protein and impurities that rise during boiling. Skimming it early keeps the broth clear and free of bitter, off-flavours.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Capsicumfits about as well
  2. Tomatofits about as well
  3. Onionthe original
  4. Parsnipfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pepper, carrot, 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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