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Modern Cookery

A hearty broth made from veal knuckle, carrots, onion, celery, herbs, mace, peppercorns, salt, calf's head, and ham.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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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 ↓

Modern Cookery

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Simmer veal with carrots, onion, celery, herbs, mace, peppercorns, and salt until meat falls from bones.

  2. Strain broth and let it cool; remove fat.

Cook the calf's head

  1. Bone the calf's head, keeping the tongue inside, and secure it with tape.

  2. Pour broth over the head and bring to a gentle boil.

  3. Skim and simmer for 1 to 1.25 hours.

  4. Place head in a deep pan, add soup, and let cool to prevent dark edges.

  5. Cut ham into quarter-inch slices, then dice.

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

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

  3. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Carrot + macetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,592 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  5. Veal + carrottop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Veal knuckle or neck
Breaks down into gelatin as it simmers, giving the broth body and a setting quality.
Calf's head with shin
Supplies rich meat and collagen that set the soup as it cools.
Ham
Adds salty, savory flavor to the finished soup.

The step that matters

Let the head cool in the broth. Cooling the head in its soup stops the exposed surfaces from darkening and keeps the meat pale and moist. Gelatin from the bones also sets the broth as it chills.

Swap the mace

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, carrot, onion, celery, ham. 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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