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Broths, Gravies, and Soups

A spiced vegetable broth made with allspice, black pepper, mace, turnip, carrot, onion, celery, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 ↓

Broths, Gravies, and Soups

Ingredients

Directions

Make the spiced stock

  1. Combine allspice, black pepper, and mace in a pot with water.

  2. Cover and simmer gently for 1.5 hours.

  3. Remove from heat and let it sit for 10 minutes.

  4. Pour the liquid into a large basin, avoiding sediment, and let it stand for about 2 hours until clear.

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Shred the turnip and carrot.

  2. Mince the onion.

  3. Cut the celery into small bits.

  4. Boil the turnip and carrot in cold water for 5 minutes, then drain.

Finish the broth

  1. Pour the clear soup into a stewpan, add the boiled roots, and simmer gently for 30 to 40 minutes until tender.

  2. Season with salt and cayenne pepper.

  3. Optionally, add mushroom catsup before serving.

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. Turnip + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Turnip + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  5. Allspice + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Allspice berries
Adds warm, aromatic spice flavour to the stock as it simmers.
Black pepper
Contributes sharp, pungent spice that flavours the stock.
Mace
Adds a delicate, aromatic warmth to the broth.
Turnip
Softens during simmering and adds mild, earthy body to the soup.
Carrot
Softens during simmering and adds gentle sweetness and colour.
Celery
Adds a fresh, savoury aromatic note to the broth.

The step that matters

Pour off the clear liquid without sediment. Letting the liquid stand and then pouring off only the top keeps sediment from clouding the broth. Settling lets heavier particles drop out, so a clear result depends on leaving them behind.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (allspice, pepper, turnip, carrot, onion, celery, mushroom):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against allspice, pepper, turnip, carrot, onion, celery, mushroom. 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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