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Soup

Cock-a-Leekie

A soup of boiled fowl and leeks, seasoned with pepper and sea salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Leek and pepper work together. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and 965 recipes mention both. Both carry 1-hexanol, which smells resin, flower. The science ↓

The recipe

Oven, in the book's wordsA cool oven

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Truss the fowl as for boiling.

  2. Wash the leeks well, scald if old, remove roots and part of the heads, and cut into 1-inch lengths.

Simmer

  1. Put the fowl into the stock with half of the leeks and simmer gently.

  2. After 30 minutes, add the remaining leeks and continue to simmer for 3-4 hours.

  3. Skim the soup carefully and season to taste.

Carve and serve

  1. Remove the fowl, carve it neatly, and place the pieces in a tureen.

  2. Pour the thick leek soup over the carved fowl.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Leek + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together965 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-hexanol (resin, flower).

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

What each ingredient does

Capon or large fowl
Gives the long simmer its body and meat, flavouring the stock as it cooks.
Leeks
Soften during the long simmer, thickening the soup and adding a mild onion-like flavour.
Stock
Forms the liquid base that carries the flavour of the fowl and leeks.

The step that matters

Simmering gently for 3-4 hours. A gentle simmer keeps the fowl tender and the stock clear. A rolling boil toughens the meat and breaks the soup cloudy, so keep the heat low and steady.

“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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