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Boiled Sauerkraut

A hearty dish of boiled sauerkraut, brisket, and seasonings simmered together.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and potato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,052 recipes. Both carry sotolon, which smells curry, maple. The science ↓

Boiled Sauerkraut

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the beef

  1. Place the brisket in a large pot with water, a little salt, and soup greens. Bring to a boil.

  2. Once the meat is tender, remove it from the pot and salt it well.

  3. Remove all bones.

Simmer with sauerkraut

  1. Return the meat to a porcelain-lined kettle with 1 cup of soup stock and desired amount of sauerkraut.

  2. Boil for 1 hour.

  3. Tie caraway seeds in a bag and add to the kettle while boiling.

  4. Thicken the mixture with the grated potatoes.

  5. Add brown sugar just before serving.

  6. If the dish is not sour enough, add a dash of vinegar.

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. Beef + potatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,052 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  2. Caraway + potatotop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together115 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-decenal (green, must).

  3. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Potato + vinegartop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,608 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Caraway + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,409 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

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

What each ingredient does

Brisket of beef
Provides the main meat, which becomes tender through long simmering.
Sauerkraut
Supplies the sour flavor that defines the dish.
Raw potatoes
Grated potatoes release starch that thickens the cooking liquid.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the sourness of the sauerkraut.
Caraway seeds
Contribute a warm, aromatic flavor to the broth.

The step that matters

Thicken the mixture with the grated potatoes. Raw grated potato releases starch as it cooks in the liquid, which thickens the broth. Adding it at the right point during simmering matters, since too little leaves the broth thin and too much can make it gluey.

Swap the caraway

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, potato, sugar, vinegar):

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Cinnamonfits better
  4. Carawaythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, potato, sugar, vinegar. 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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