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Vegetable Stock

A clear stock made from carrots, onions, turnip, tomatoes, celery, lettuce, herbs, mace, peppercorns, cloves, butter, water, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Vegetable Stock

Why it works: Parsley and thyme 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 ↓

Vegetable Stock

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. Slice onions, turnips, and carrots thinly.

  2. Chop celery into small pieces.

Make the stock

  1. Heat the butter in a stewpan.

  2. Add the vegetables and fry gently until softened.

  3. Pour in the water and add the bouquet-garni, mace, peppercorns, cloves, and salt.

  4. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 1 hour.

  5. 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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  4. Turnip + lettucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together526 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

Butter
Fat that softens the vegetables and carries flavour before the water goes in.
Onions
Add sweetness and savoury depth as they soften and brown lightly in the butter.
Carrots
Contribute natural sweetness and body to the finished stock.

The step that matters

Fry the vegetables gently until softened. Frying over high heat can brown and bitter the vegetables, giving the stock a harsh taste. Gentle heat softens them and draws out their sweetness, so the stock stays clear and mellow.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (carrot, turnip, tomato, celery, lettuce, parsley, thyme):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against carrot, turnip, tomato, celery, lettuce, parsley, thyme. 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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