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Portable Soup

A soup made from beef, veal, fowls, and spices, boiled, strained, thickened, dried into cakes, and reconstituted with water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Portable Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the stock

  1. Combine water, beef, veal, and fowls in a large pot.

  2. Break the bones and cut the meat into small pieces.

  3. Season with black pepper, Jamaica pepper, and mace.

  4. Cover the pot tightly and simmer for 12 to 14 hours.

  5. Strain the mixture.

  6. Remove the fat.

Thicken and dry

  1. Boil the jelly gently in a saucepan without covering it, stirring frequently until it thickens and lumps form.

  2. Pour the thickened soup into saucers, filling them halfway.

  3. Allow to cool and dry on flannel before the fire or in the sun.

Store and use

  1. Store the dried cakes in a tin box with white paper between each cake.

  2. To use, dissolve about 1 ounce of the soup in boiling water with a little salt.

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 + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

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

  2. Beef + vealtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,784 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + macetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,257 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  4. Veal + macetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,761 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  5. Veal + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,049 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Pepper and mace barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,257 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Shin of beef
Breaks down during long simmering to give the stock body and rich savoury flavour.
Knuckle of veal
Its bones and connective tissue release gelatin, helping the stock set into a firm jelly.
Fowls
Add meaty flavour and gelatin to the stock during the long simmer.
Whole black pepper
Adds pungent, aromatic heat that seasons the stock throughout.

The step that matters

Boil the jelly gently and uncovered. Gentle, uncovered boiling lets water evaporate so the gelatin-rich stock concentrates and thickens. Vigorous boiling can scorch the bottom and make the result cloudy or bitter, while stopping too early leaves it too soft to dry into cakes.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Sagefits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Macethe original

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