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Stock for Gravy

A beef stock made with lean beef, vegetables, herbs, and wine, used as a base for gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
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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 ↓

Stock for Gravy

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the meat

  1. Place the thinly cut lean beef in a gravy pot, without any fat. Cover and heat gently, shaking often until the juices are absorbed back into the meat.

  2. Add enough water to cover the meat and let it simmer.

Make the broth

  1. Add a small amount of water, herbs, onion, spices, and a bit of ham. Simmer until rich.

  2. In a separate casserole, melt the butter and add carrots, onions, parsley, thyme, cloves, bay leaves, and the ham. Season with salt and pepper.

  3. Pour in the white wine and broth, cover, and simmer until everything is mashed. Strain through a fine sieve.

Finish

  1. In another casserole, stew the mushrooms, parsley, and chives in a pint of water until flavorful. Strain both liquids and heat them together.

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. 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 + thymetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

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

Lean beef
Provides the main meaty flavor and body of the stock as it simmers.
Carrots
Add natural sweetness and aromatic depth to the broth.
Dry white wine
Adds acidity and aromatic complexity that brightens the stock.
Mushrooms
Contribute savory umami flavor to the finished liquid.
Butter
Carries and blends the aromatics, adding richness to the stock.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, meat, ham, butter, carrot, parsley, thyme):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, meat, ham, butter, carrot, 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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