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Vegetable Stock

A clear broth made by simmering carrots, turnips, onions, parsley, celery, peas, and seasonings in butter and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Vegetable Stock

Why it works: Carrot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,053 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Vegetable Stock

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a stew pan, melt the butter over medium heat.

  2. Add the carrots, turnips, onions, parsley, and celery; fry until the vegetables begin to turn red.

  3. Moisten with hot water, bring to a boil, and skim off any foam.

  4. Add salt, black peppercorns, bouquet garni, and green peas.

  5. Simmer for 1 hour, skimming off any oil that rises.

  6. Strain the broth into a basin through a fine sieve.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

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

  2. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Parsley + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

  5. Turnip + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,418 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

Carrots
Provide sweetness and body to the broth as they cook down.
Onions
Add sweetness and savory depth as they soften and brown lightly in butter.
Butter
Carries the frying vegetables and adds richness to the broth.
Turnips
Contribute mild sweetness and earthy flavor to the stock.
Celery
Adds aromatic, savory flavor to the broth.

The step that matters

Frying the vegetables until they begin to turn red. Browning the vegetables in butter develops deeper, sweeter flavor through caramelization and Maillard reactions. Frying too hard can scorch the butter and leave a bitter taste in the finished stock.

Swap the peas

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (carrot, turnip, onion, butter, parsley, celery):

  1. Lentilsfits better
  2. Beansfits better
  3. Chickpeafits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against carrot, turnip, onion, butter, parsley, celery. 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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