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Soup

Gravy Soup

A simple soup made with fat, onion, carrots, celery, beef broth, flour, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 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 ↓

Gravy Soup

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. In a pot, heat the fat over medium heat.

  2. Add the onion, carrots, and celery; sauté until softened.

  3. Stir in the flour and cook for 1 minute.

Simmer and serve

  1. Pour in the beef broth and bring to a boil.

  2. Reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes.

  3. Season with salt and pepper 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. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  3. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Onion + beeftop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Thickens the broth into a gravy-like body as it cooks with the fat.
Beef broth
Forms the liquid base of the soup and carries the other flavors.
Onion
Softens and adds savory sweetness to the base as it sautés.
Carrots
Soften during cooking and add natural sweetness to the soup.
Celery
Softens during sautéing and adds aromatic, savory depth to the soup.

The step that matters

Cooking the flour in the fat. Flour must be cooked briefly in the hot fat so its starch is coated and no raw, floury taste remains. Adding the broth too soon can leave lumps, so the flour should be stirred in and cooked before the liquid goes in.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (carrot, celery, beef, pepper, flour):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against carrot, celery, beef, pepper, flour. 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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