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Turtle Soup

A soup made from turtle meat, ham, beef, veal, mushrooms, spices, and stock, simmered for hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Turtle Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the turtle

  1. Kill the turtle and let it cool overnight to bleed.

  2. Cut off the fins and separate the fleshy parts and fat from the shell.

  3. Divide the upper and lower shells into large pieces with a kitchen saw.

  4. Scald the shells in boiling water and scrape the fins.

  5. Put the shells and fins into a large stock pot covered with hot water and boil until the glutinous substance separates from the bone.

  6. Cut the turtle meat into square pieces and set aside in pans.

  7. Return the bones to the broth and boil for an additional hour.

Make the soup

  1. Spread ¼ pound of butter on the bottom of a large stock pot.

  2. Add the ham, soup beef, veal, and turtle meat.

  3. Moisten with 4 quarts of stock and add mushrooms, cloves, allspice, mace, parsley bouquet, bay leaves, and green onions.

  4. Bring to a boil, then reduce the liquid to a glaze.

  5. Fill the pot with water and the broth from the turtle bones, skim, and let it boil gently for 6 hours.

  6. Strain through a soup cloth for use.

  7. Make a roux with 2 pounds of fresh butter and thicken the turtle liquor as you would other sauces.

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. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Beef + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  3. Clove + macetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  4. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  5. Allspice + macetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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

What each ingredient does

Turtle
Provides the main meat and the gelatinous substance that gives the soup body.
Veal
Adds rich meat flavour and body to the stock as it simmers for hours.
Soup beef
Adds meaty flavour and depth to the long-simmered broth.
Raw ham
Contributes salty, savoury meat flavour that seasons the broth.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and forms the base of the roux that thickens the soup.

The step that matters

Reducing the liquid to a glaze. Reducing concentrates flavour and gelatin from the bones and meat. If it reduces too far it can scorch on the pot bottom, and it must be diluted again before the long simmer.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, ham, beef, veal, mushroom, clove, allspice):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, ham, beef, veal, mushroom, clove, allspice. 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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