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Clear Gravy Soups

A clear broth made from ham, beef, veal, onions, turnips, carrots, celery, cloves, mace, and water.

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 ↓

Clear Gravy Soups

Ingredients

Directions

Brown the meat

  1. Place the ham slices at the bottom of a large stew-pan or stock-pot with the beef and veal.

  2. Break the bones and add them to the meat.

  3. Add the onions, turnips, carrots, celery, cloves, and mace.

  4. Cover the pan and heat over medium-high until the meat sticks to the bottom.

  5. When a brown glaze forms, cover the meat with hot water.

Simmer and skim

  1. When it approaches a boil, add ½ pint of cold water and skim off the scum.

  2. Repeat adding ½ pint of cold water and skimming until no more scum rises.

  3. Reduce heat and simmer gently for about 4 hours.

Strain and clarify

  1. Strain the broth through a clean cloth into a stone pan without squeezing.

  2. Let it cool, then remove the fat carefully.

  3. If the broth is not clear, beat 2 egg whites and their shells, add to the broth, and heat while stirring until it boils.

  4. Let it settle for 10 minutes, then strain again through a fine cloth.

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. Carrot + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,873 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Onion + turniptop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Lean beef
Provides rich meaty flavor and gelatin-rich body to the broth.
Veal
Adds gelatin and a delicate body to the broth.
Onions
Contribute sweetness and aromatic depth to the broth.
Celery
Adds aromatic vegetal flavor to the broth.
Egg whites (in the method)
Coagulate and trap cloudy particles so they can be strained out, clarifying the broth.

The step that matters

Skimming the scum. Scum is coagulated protein and impurities that cloud the broth and taste bitter if left in. Removing it as it rises keeps the broth clear and clean-tasting.

Swap the clove

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

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

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