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Soup

Potage a LA Couhte Bouillon

A consommé soup made with ham, beef, veal, vegetables, sherry, and served with fried rolls.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Potage a LA Couhte Bouillon

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the soup

  1. Prepare ham, beef, and veal in a pan with spices and vegetables as for soupe de santé.

  2. Add consommé and sherry, then cook until the meat is well done.

  3. Pass the mixture through a fine sieve into a basin.

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Prepare carrots and celery as for vegetable soup, blanch and stew them in strong consommé.

  2. Fry the small onions until brown and add them to the soup pot with the other vegetables.

Simmer and serve

  1. Simmer the soup gently for four hours, skimming as needed.

  2. Fry the crusts of two French rolls until light brown and place them in a tureen.

  3. Pour the soup over the fried rolls.

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

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Celery + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Beef + carrottop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,606 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Ham
Adds a savoury, cured flavour that deepens the broth.
Beef
Gives the soup rich meaty flavour and body as it cooks down.
Veal
Adds a delicate meat flavour and gelatin that gives the broth body.
Sherry
Adds aroma and a slight acidity that brightens the rich meat flavours.
Small onions
Browning them adds sweetness and depth to the soup.
French rolls
Fried crusts soak up the soup and add a crisp, toasted texture.

The step that matters

Simmer the soup gently for four hours, skimming as needed. A hard boil breaks up fat and proteins into the liquid, making the soup cloudy. Gentle simmering and skimming keep it clear and clean-tasting.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, beef, veal, sherry, carrot, onion, butter):

  1. Celerythe original
  2. Parsleyfits about as well
  3. Thymefits about as well
  4. Marjoramfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, beef, veal, sherry, carrot, onion, butter. 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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