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Hebb Gumbo

A veal and ham broth with various greens, simmered for hours and served over rice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Spinach and turnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 320 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Hebb Gumbo

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the leaves and use only the tender parts.

  2. Fry the veal and ham in a pot.

  3. Add the leaves and seasoning to the pot.

Cook and finish

  1. Boil for about 4 hours.

  2. Strain the mixture and chop the leaves very fine.

  3. Return the chopped leaves to the broth.

  4. Add the butter and stir.

  5. Serve with boiled rice.

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. Spinach + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together320 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Cabbage + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together897 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Celery + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Turnip + marjoramtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together367 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Pepper + marjoramtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,609 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Veal
Provides the meat and rich flavour that forms the base of the broth.
Ham
Adds smoky, salty flavour to the fried base of the broth.
Butter
Adds fat and a silky richness to the finished broth.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, celery, spinach, cabbage, pepper, turnip, marjoram):

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Parsnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, celery, spinach, cabbage, pepper, turnip, marjoram. 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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