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Ox-tail Soup

A hearty soup made by simmering ox tails with onions, spices, and ketchup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Basil and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,294 recipes. Both carry methyl cinnamate, which smells strawberry. The science ↓

Ox-tail Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the tails

  1. Divide the ox tails into joints.

  2. Wash them in lukewarm water.

  3. Dry with a cloth.

  4. Dredge the tails with flour.

  5. Fry in sweet dripping until light brown.

  6. Place the fried tails in a stewpan with warm water.

Make the soup

  1. Slice the onions.

  2. Dredge with flour. Fry until brown.

  3. Add hot water and mix well.

  4. Pour the onion mixture into the stewpan with the tails.

  5. Add allspice, black peppercorns, basil, and sliced carrot tied in muslin.

  6. Stir occasionally until it boils.

  7. Cover and simmer on low heat for about 3 hours until the meat is tender.

  8. Remove the tails and strain the soup over them.

Chill and finish

  1. Let cool, preferably overnight.

  2. Before serving, remove the fat from the top.

  3. Cut the meat into pieces.

  4. Stir in salt, cayenne, and ketchup.

  5. Return the mixture to the stewpan.

  6. Simmer for about 30 minutes without boiling.

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. Basil + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,294 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  2. Basil + carrottop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,113 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  3. Allspice + basiltop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together195 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Allspice + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Allspice + carrottop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,021 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

Ox tails
Collagen-rich connective tissue that breaks down during long simmering to give body and tender meat.
Flour
Dredging coat that browns in the fat and helps thicken the soup.
Sweet dripping
Fat for frying that carries browning flavour into the tails and onions.
Onions
Fried until brown, adding sweetness and savoury depth to the broth.
Ketchup
Adds tangy sweetness and acidity to the finished soup.

The step that matters

Simmer gently until the meat is tender. Boiling vigorously toughens meat proteins and can cloud the broth. A slow, low simmer lets the connective tissue in the ox tails break down into gelatin, giving tender meat and a rich body.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, allspice, basil, carrot, pepper, ketchup):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Turnipfits better
  3. Parsnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, allspice, basil, carrot, pepper, ketchup. 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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