To Clear Stock
Ingredients
Directions
Clarify the stock
Beat the egg white slightly and add it along with the crushed shells to the cold stock.
Heat the stock slowly to boiling and boil for 10 minutes until a thick scum forms.
Settle and strain
Remove from heat and add ½ cup of cold water.
Let it stand for 10 minutes.
Strain through a napkin with a fine wire sieve to catch the scum and shells.
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
What each ingredient does
- Egg white
- As it heats, it coagulates and traps fine particles and impurities into a scum that can be removed.
- Crushed egg shells
- Add extra surface area that helps gather fine particles into the forming scum.
- Stock
- Serves as the liquid base that is clarified.
- Cold water
- Cools the stock so the scum firms and settles for easier straining.
The step that matters
Heat the stock slowly to boiling. Gentle heating lets the egg white coagulate slowly and capture particles in a firm raft. Rapid or vigorous boiling breaks up the scum, dispersing particles and leaving the stock cloudy.
“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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