Why it works: Ham and endive work together. They rank in the top 23% of all ingredient pairs, and 11 recipes mention both. Both carry 1-octen-3-ol, which smells mushroom, earthy. The science ↓
The recipe
Ingredients
Directions
Make the stock
Place 6 slices of lean ham at the bottom of a stewpan.
Layer 3 pounds of lean beef over the ham, then cover with 3 pounds of lean veal.
Add 6 sliced onions, 2 sliced carrots, 2 sliced turnips, 2 heads of celery, a bundle of sweet herbs, 6 cloves, and 2 blades of mace.
Add a little water at the bottom and cook gently until it sticks.
Pour in 1 gallon of boiling water and let it simmer for 2 hours.
Season with salt and strain the soup.
Add the vegetables and serve
In another stewpan, sweat 1 carrot, 1 turnip, 2 heads of leeks, 2 heads of celery, 2 heads of endive, 2 cabbage lettuces, a little sorrel, and a little chervil gently for 15 minutes.
Add the sweated vegetables to the soup and boil gently for 10 minutes.
Serve in a tureen with the crust of a French roll.
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.
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Ham + endivetop 23% of all pairsAroma overlaplowMentioned together11 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
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Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together10,172 recipes
Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
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Carrot + turniptop 2% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together8,001 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
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Beef + oniontop 3% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together17,091 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Turnip + celerytop 3% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together4,417 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
- Lean beef
- Gives the stock its meaty body and rich beefy flavour as it simmers.
- Lean veal
- Adds gelatin-rich body and a delicate savoury depth to the stock.
- Onions
- Contribute sweetness and aromatic depth to the stock as they cook down.
- Carrots
- Add natural sweetness and colour to the stock and vegetables.
- Leeks
- Add a mild onion-like sweetness and aroma to the finished soup.
- Endive
- Adds a slightly bitter note and fresh vegetable texture to the soup.
The step that matters
Cooking the stock gently. Simmering rather than boiling keeps the broth clear and prevents meat proteins and fats from emulsifying into a cloudy, greasy liquid. Gentle heat also extracts flavour more evenly from the meat and bones.
Flavor stand-ins for the clove
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, beef, veal, onion, carrot, turnip, celery):
- Parsleybetter flavor fit
- Pepperbetter flavor fit
- Thymebetter flavor fit
- Clovethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against ham, beef, veal, onion, carrot, turnip, celery. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).
“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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