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Drink

White Stock

A clear veal and ham stock made with water, onions, turnip, celery, mace, peppercorns, bay leaf, thyme, and parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

White Stock

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. In a large pot, combine the veal, ham, and cold water.

  2. Add the onions, turnip, celery, mace, and peppercorns.

  3. Include the bay leaf, thyme, and parsley in a bouquet.

Simmer and strain

  1. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for several hours.

  2. Strain the stock and discard the solids.

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. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Turnip + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,842 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Celery + thymetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,193 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

What each ingredient does

Knuckle veal
Releases gelatin and collagen during long simmering, giving the stock body and a silky mouthfeel.
Lean ham
Adds savory depth and meaty flavor to the stock.
Onions
Contribute sweetness and aromatic flavor as they cook down into the liquid.

The step that matters

Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer. Boiling vigorously makes the stock cloudy and emulsifies fat into it. A gentle simmer keeps the liquid clear while collagen slowly dissolves, giving a clean, well-bodied stock.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Winter savoryfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, ham, onion, turnip, celery, thyme, parsley. 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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