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Pot Au Feu

A French beef stew simmered for three hours with bones, meat, and vegetables.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Turnip and leek match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,046 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Pot Au Feu

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the meat

  1. Remove the bones from the beef and break the bones up.

  2. Place the bones in a large pot.

  3. Tie the meat into a neat shape and lay it on top of the bones.

  4. Add salt and add water.

Make the broth

  1. Bring the liquid to a boil and skim off the scum.

  2. Add a little cold water and bring to a boil again.

  3. Repeat this process once more.

  4. Add the chopped vegetables and bring to a boil again.

  5. Reduce the heat and simmer gently for 3 hours.

Serve

  1. Remove all vegetables.

  2. Serve the meat and vegetables as a second course.

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. Turnip + leektop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,046 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Carrot + leektop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,310 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

Beef
Provides the main protein, which firms and becomes tender during long, gentle simmering.
Carrots
Add sweetness and body to the broth as they soften during simmering.
Leeks
Add a mild onion-like aroma and subtle sweetness to the broth.
Celery
Adds savory, aromatic flavor to the broth as it simmers.
Turnips
Add mild sweetness and a tender texture to the cooked vegetables.

The step that matters

Skimming the scum after the first boil. Scum is coagulated protein and impurities that rise to the surface. Skimming it keeps the broth clear and clean-tasting, and the repeated cold-water additions help bring these impurities up for removal.

Swap the leek

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

  1. Parsnipfits about as well
  2. Leekthe original
  3. Spinachfits less well
  4. Lettucefits less well

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