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Broths and Soups

A hearty beef broth made with bacon or ham, cow‑heel, vegetables, herbs, and finished with lemon, mushroom ketchup, and Madeira or sherry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 20 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and winter savory match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 780 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Broths and Soups

Ingredients

Directions

Start the broth

  1. Lay the bacon or ham at the bottom of a stewpan.

  2. Add the beef, cow‑heel, carrot, thyme, savory, parsley, basil, shallots, onion, allspice, and black pepper.

  3. Pour in ½ cup of cold water, cover the pan, and set it on low heat to boil gently for 15 minutes.

  4. Watch carefully to prevent burning.

Simmer and thicken

  1. When browned, fill the pan with boiling water and let it simmer for 2 hours.

  2. Mix 2‑3 tablespoons of flour with a ladleful of gravy until smooth.

  3. Pour the mixture into the stewpan.

  4. Let it simmer gently for another 30 minutes.

  5. Skim and strain the broth through a fine sieve into the stewpan.

  6. Cut the cow‑heel into small pieces.

Finish

  1. Add the lemon juice, mushroom ketchup, salt, black pepper, nutmeg, and Madeira or sherry.

  2. Simmer for an additional 5 minutes.

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 + winter savorytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together780 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

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

  4. Thyme + basiltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,768 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  5. Lemon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 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

Lean gravy beef
Provides the main meaty flavour and body for the broth.
Cow-heel
Adds gelatin, giving the finished broth a richer, silkier body.
Flour
Thickens the broth as it is stirred into the hot liquid.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the savoury flavours.
Madeira or sherry
Adds sweetness and aromatic depth to the finished broth.

The step that matters

Watch carefully to prevent burning. Browning the meat and bones builds rich flavour, but scorched bits on the pan bottom turn bitter and can taint the whole broth.

“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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