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Portable Soup

A beef soup made with veal, beef shins, and fine beef, simmered with spices and onions.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Portable Soup

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Boil the veal, shins of beef, and juicy beef in enough water to cover them.

  2. When the bones are cracked, remove the marrow.

  3. Add your choice of spices and the onions.

  4. Continue boiling until the meat is tender and falls apart.

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. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Veal + beeftop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,784 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

  3. Beef + meattop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,533 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  4. Meat + oniontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,364 recipes

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

  5. Veal + oniontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,841 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Veal knuckles
Bones and connective tissue release gelatin, giving the broth body and a richer mouthfeel.
Beef shins
Collagen-rich meat and bone break down during long simmering, adding gelatin and savory depth.
Juicy beef
Lean meat cooks into tender pieces that flavor the broth and can be eaten with it.
Onions
Release sugars and aromatic compounds during simmering, adding sweetness and savory flavor.

The step that matters

Continue boiling until the meat is tender and falls apart. Collagen in the shins and bones converts slowly to gelatin over long, gentle simmering. Stopping early leaves tough meat and a thin broth. Keep the liquid at a steady simmer rather than a hard rolling boil.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, beef, meat):

  1. Onionthe original
  2. Potatofits about as well
  3. Tomatofits about as well
  4. Carrotfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, beef, meat. 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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