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Stock for Pie

A rich stock made from geese, turkeys, fowls, ham, onions, celery, herbs, and water, used for pie.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and parsley 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 ↓

Stock for Pie

Ingredients

Directions

Make the stock

  1. Place all ingredients into a stewpan with the water.

  2. Simmer slowly for 2 hours, ensuring it does not catch at the bottom.

  3. Fill the stewpan with stock and boil slowly for 3 hours.

  4. Strain the liquid and refill the stewpan with water, boiling it all evening.

Finish and fill the pie

  1. Skim the fat off the first liquid and reduce it to fill the pie after baking.

  2. Pour the stock into the pie an hour after it is out of the oven, covering the bacon.

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. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

  3. Celery + thymetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,193 recipes

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

  4. Onion + thymetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,171 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Bones of geese and turkeys
Release gelatin during long simmering, giving the stock body and a jelly-like set.
Old fowls
Add deep meaty flavour and gelatin, adding body to the stock.
Lean ham
Adds savoury, salty depth that carries through the whole stock.
Onions
Contribute sweetness and aromatic depth as they break down during simmering.

The step that matters

Simmer gently and watch the bottom of the stewpan. If the stock catches on the base, it scorches and turns bitter, spoiling the whole batch. Skimming the fat matters too, because fat left in the stock makes the finished jelly greasy.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (turkey, ham, celery, thyme, parsley):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against turkey, ham, celery, thyme, parsley. 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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