Name: To Make Good Stock
Ingredients: Bones (any available); 1 knuckle of veal, sliced; 1 pound lean beef, sliced; 1 pound lean gammon of bacon, sliced; 2 or 3 scraped carrots, sliced; 2 onions, sliced; 2 turnips, sliced; 2 heads of celery, sliced; 2 quarts water

Why it works: Carrot and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

To Make Good Stock

Ingredients

Directions

Make the bone base

Break the bones into pieces and place them in a large pot.
Boil the bones for 3 to 4 hours.
Pour off the liquid into a stock pot.

Stew the stock

Add the sliced veal, beef, bacon, carrots, onions, turnips, celery, and water.
Stew until the meat is tender, ensuring it does not burn.
For brown gravy, add coloring and boil for a few minutes.

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.

Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together10,173 recipes

Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together8,002 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Turnip + celerytop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,418 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Onion + turniptop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together7,585 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Bones: Release gelatin and body into the liquid, giving the stock its richness.
Veal knuckle: Adds gelatin and depth, so the stock feels fuller in the mouth.
Lean beef: Contributes meaty flavour as it cooks slowly in the liquid.
Lean gammon of bacon: Adds savoury, salty depth to the stock.
Onions: Provide sweetness and aroma as they soften and release flavour.
Celery: Adds aromatic, savoury background flavour to the stock.

The step that matters

Keeping the stew from burning. Stewing at a gentle simmer keeps the meat tender and the stock clear. Sticking or scorching on the bottom gives the liquid a bitter, burnt taste that cannot be removed later.

Swap the onion

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

Leekfits better
Parsnipfits better
Onionthe original
Spinachfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, beef, carrot, turnip, 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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To Make Good Stock