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Mutton Broth, Quickly Made

A quick mutton broth made by simmering mutton pieces, herbs, onion, pepper, and salt in water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 68,474 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Mutton Broth, Quickly Made

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the mutton into small pieces, removing skin and fat.

Simmer

  1. Place the meat and bones in a saucepan with water and the other ingredients.

  2. Cover the saucepan and bring to a boil quickly.

  3. Remove the lid and boil rapidly for 20 minutes, skimming off any foam.

Strain and skim

  1. Strain the broth into a basin.

  2. If fat remains on the surface, place a piece of thin blotting paper on top to absorb it.

  3. For best results, allow the broth to cool completely to remove fat easily.

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. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  2. Mutton + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,442 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  3. Mutton + oniontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,531 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Mutton
Provides the meat and bones that give the broth its flavour and body.
Water
Acts as the liquid that extracts flavour and gelatin from the meat and bones.
Sweet herbs
Add aromatic flavour to the broth as it simmers.

The step that matters

Skimming off the foam while boiling. Foam carries impurities from the meat that cloud the broth and taste bitter if left in. Skimming during the rapid boil keeps the broth clear and clean-flavoured.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Tomatofits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, 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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