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Shin of Beef Soup

A hearty soup made from beef shin, turnips, potatoes, carrots, cabbage, simmered in water with salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Turnip and carrot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,002 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Shin of Beef Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Break the shin of beef into 3-4 pieces and place in a pot.

  2. Pour 4 gallons of cold water over the beef and simmer for 4-5 hours.

  3. Add enough water to maintain a total of 1.5 gallons of soup.

  4. Stir in 1 teaspoon of salt.

Add the vegetables

  1. After 2 hours, add the grated turnips, grated potatoes, grated carrots, and finely chopped cabbage to the pot.

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. Turnip + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Turnip + cabbagetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together897 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Potato + carrottop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,107 recipes

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

  4. Carrot + cabbagetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,505 recipes

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

  5. Turnip + potatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together562 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Shin of beef
Releases flavour and gelatin into the broth during long simmering, giving body to the soup.
Turnips
Add mild sweetness and body, softening as the soup cooks.
Potatoes
Break down slightly as they cook, thickening the soup and adding starch.
Carrots
Contribute sweetness and colour to the broth as they cook.
Cabbage
Adds bulk and a mild, sweet flavour as it softens in the broth.

The step that matters

Maintaining the soup volume. Water boils off during the long simmer, concentrating the broth and changing its flavour. Adding water to keep the total at 1.5 gallons keeps the seasoning and consistency balanced.

Swap the cabbage

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

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Parsnipfits better
  3. Onionfits better
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, turnip, potato, carrot. 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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