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Soup

Clear Soup Consomme

A clear beef consommé made by simmering beef and vegetables for six hours, then straining.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Clear Soup Consomme

Ingredients

Directions

Make the consommé

  1. Place the beef in a large pot with the cold water over low heat.

  2. Add the celery, turnips, carrots, onions, parsley, thyme, winter savory, allspice, peppercorns, lemon peel, ketchup, and season with salt and pepper.

  3. Bring to a boil and let it simmer for 6 hours.

Strain and serve

  1. When ready to serve, strain the soup through a fine sieve and then through a clean cloth to ensure it is perfectly clear.

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. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

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

  3. Parsley + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Celery + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  5. Lemon + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,973 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Releases flavor and gelatin into the water, giving the broth body and savoriness.
Ketchup
Adds tomato acidity and sweetness that rounds out the savory broth.
Onions
Contribute sweetness and aromatic depth as they cook slowly into the stock.

The step that matters

Keeping the simmer gentle. A rolling boil agitates the liquid and breaks up proteins and fat, which clouds the consommé. Holding a gentle simmer for the full 6 hours lets the broth stay clear while the flavor develops.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, celery, turnip, carrot, parsley, lemon, thyme. 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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