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Soup

Portable Soup

A hearty soup made from veal, beef, ham, celery, carrots, butter, anchovies, mace, and cayenne pepper, simmered for hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and carrot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Portable Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the meat

  1. Layer the meat with butter, anchovies, and mace in a large cauldron.

  2. Add the chopped celery and carrots.

  3. Cover and cook over moderate heat until the gravy begins to draw.

  4. Continue to extract the gravy, then cover the meat with water.

  5. Let it boil gently for 4 hours.

Reduce and set

  1. Strain the mixture through a fine sieve into a clean pan until reduced to one-third.

  2. Strain the extracted gravy and boil gently until it thickens.

  3. Season with cayenne and pour into dishes to a thickness of 1 inch.

  4. Dry the dishes in the sun and store in tight boxes.

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. Celery + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

  4. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

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

  5. Beef + carrottop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,606 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

Veal
Breaks down into gelatin that gives the finished soup its body and firm set.
Beef
Adds meaty depth and extra gelatin so the reduced gravy sets firmly.
Ham
Contributes savoury, salty flavour to the concentrated gravy.
Anchovies
Melt into the gravy, adding deep savoury umami without a clearly fishy taste.
Celery
Adds aromatic, vegetal flavour that builds the base of the gravy.
Carrots
Add natural sweetness and aroma to balance the savoury meat stock.

The step that matters

Reducing the strained gravy until it thickens. Long, gentle boiling concentrates the dissolved gelatin and flavour. If it is under-reduced, the soup will not set firm when cooled; boiling too hard can scorch it and make it taste bitter.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, beef, ham, butter, celery, carrot, pepper):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, beef, ham, butter, celery, carrot, pepper. 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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