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Calf's Foot Broth

A broth made by boiling calf's feet, reducing the liquid, and seasoning with sugar, wine, nutmeg, salt, butter, and egg yolk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Wine and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,645 recipes. Both carry 2-furfurylthiol, which smells coffee, roasted. The science ↓

Calf's Foot Broth

Ingredients

Directions

Make the jelly

  1. Boil the calf's feet in a gallon of water until reduced by half.

  2. Let the mixture cool, then remove the fat and keep the jelly.

Make the broth

  1. Take 1 cup of the jelly to make the broth.

  2. Add sugar, wine, nutmeg, and salt.

  3. Stir quickly without boiling.

  4. Add a little butter and the yolk of an egg for improvement.

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. Wine + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,645 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  2. Nutmeg + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Nutmeg + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together24,744 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Nutmeg and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 24,744 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Calf's feet
Release gelatin as they boil, forming the jelly that gives the broth body.
Egg yolk
Adds richness and helps thicken and enrich the broth.
Butter
Adds fat, giving the broth a smoother, richer mouthfeel.
Wine
Adds acidity and aroma to the broth.

The step that matters

Stir quickly without boiling. Egg yolk thickens by gentle heat and can curdle or scramble if the broth boils, so keep it below a simmer while stirring.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, wine, butter, egg):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Tarragonfits less well
  4. Thymefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, wine, butter, egg. 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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