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Gouffe's Receipt for Stock, or Bouillon

A clear beef stock made by simmering beef, bones, vegetables, and salt in water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Leek and turnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,046 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Gouffe's Receipt for Stock, or Bouillon

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a large pot, combine the beef, bones, and clear cold water.

  2. Add the coarse sea salt, carrots, onions, leeks, celery, turnips, and parsnip.

  3. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for several hours.

  4. Strain the stock through a fine sieve 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. Leek + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,046 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Turnip + parsniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together590 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Leek + parsniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together165 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Carrot + parsniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,097 recipes

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

  5. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Gives the stock its meaty flavor as it simmers in the water.
Bones
Release gelatin and body into the liquid, giving the stock a richer mouthfeel.
Onions
Add sweetness and savory depth as they cook down into the liquid.
Carrots
Contribute gentle sweetness and aroma to the simmering liquid.
Leeks
Add a mild, sweet onion-like aroma to the stock.
Celery
Adds aromatic, herbal background flavor to the stock.

The step that matters

Simmer gently rather than boil. A hard boil makes the liquid cloudy and can emulsify fat into it, while a gentle simmer keeps the stock clear and easier to skim.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, carrot, onion, leek, celery, turnip, parsnip):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, carrot, onion, leek, celery, turnip, parsnip. 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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