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Hotch-potch

A hearty stew of mutton or lamb chops with mixed vegetables, simmered slowly in stock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Spinach and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 427 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Hotch-potch

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the broth

  1. In a large pot, bring the stock or broth to a boil.

  2. Add dried peas and boil for an hour or more until tender.

Simmer and finish

  1. Add the meat and other vegetables, cover, and simmer on low for 2.5 hours.

  2. If using green peas or asparagus, add them in the last 30 minutes of cooking.

  3. Season with pepper and coarse sea salt before serving.

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. Spinach + lettucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together427 recipes

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

  2. Turnip + lettucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together526 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Asparagus + spinachtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together274 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol (clove, smoky).

  5. Turnip + spinachtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together320 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

Mutton or lamb chops
Long, slow simmering turns the meat tender and gives the broth its rich flavor.
Stock or broth
Forms the cooking liquid that carries flavor and keeps the meat and vegetables moist.
Dried peas
Hardy legumes that soften slowly and thicken the stew as they break down.
Mixed vegetables
Add sweetness, color, and texture; tender types are timed later so they keep their shape.

The step that matters

Adding green peas or asparagus. These vegetables cook quickly and turn dull and mushy with long simmering, so adding them in the last 30 minutes keeps them bright and tender-crisp.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, turnip, carrot, asparagus, peas, spinach, lettuce):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Beetrootfits better
  3. Endivefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, turnip, carrot, asparagus, peas, spinach, lettuce. 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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