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Broths, Gravies, and Soups

A savory broth made by simmering meat trimmings, onion, herbs, and spices in water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Broths, Gravies, and Soups

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the trimmings and parings of meat, game, or poultry.

  2. Place them in a stew-pan and cover with water or the liquor from boiled meat.

  3. Add the onion, parsley, sweet herbs, and allspice.

Simmer and season

  1. Simmer gently to extract flavors.

  2. Season with ground black pepper and coarse sea salt to taste.

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 + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Parsley + allspicetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,289 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

  5. Corn + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,324 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Trimmings and parings of meat, game, or poultry
Provide the main meaty flavor and gelatin that gives the broth body as they simmer.
Onion
Adds savory sweetness and aromatic depth to the broth.
Water
Acts as the solvent that draws flavor and body out of the meat.

The step that matters

Simmer gently to extract flavors. Boiling vigorously makes the broth cloudy and emulsifies fat into it, while a gentle simmer keeps it clear and extracts flavor steadily.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, parsley, corn, allspice, pepper):

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, parsley, corn, allspice, 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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