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Hare Soup

A hearty soup made from hare, vegetables, herbs, and spices, simmered and strained, then returned with flour and wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Hare Soup

Why it works: Thyme and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,225 recipes. Both carry terpineol, which smells pine, woody. The science ↓

Hare Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the hare

  1. Cut the hare into small pieces.

Simmer and strain

  1. Put the hare into a saucepan with the chopped vegetables, herbs, spices, salt, pepper, and water.

  2. Simmer gently for three hours.

  3. Pass the mixture through a wire sieve, picking out the best pieces of meat.

Finish and serve

  1. Cut the meat into small pieces and add them back to the soup along with the wine and mixed flour.

  2. Boil for five minutes and serve.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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 + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

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

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Parsley + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Parsley + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

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

  5. Carrot + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together687 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Hare
Provides the main meat and flavour of the soup, becoming tender during long simmering.
Flour
Thickens the soup as it heats, giving it a fuller body.
Port wine
Adds depth, sweetness and aroma to the finished soup.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, carrying flavour and smoothness to the soup.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, parsley, pepper, carrot, flour, thyme, marjoram):

  1. Winter savoryfits better
  2. Sagefits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, parsley, pepper, carrot, flour, thyme, marjoram. 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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