Skip to main content
Main

Broth of Beef, Mutton, and Veal

A clear broth made from beef, veal, and mutton simmered with herbs and peppercorns.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Beef and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Broth of Beef, Mutton, and Veal

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Put the beef, veal, mutton, herbs, and peppercorns into a large saucepan.

  2. Add 5 quarts of water and simmer until reduced to 3 quarts.

  3. If desired, add an onion for flavor.

  4. Let the broth cool.

  5. Remove the fat.

  6. Place a piece of clean blotting paper on the broth in the basin.

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

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

  2. Beef + muttontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,373 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

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

  4. Veal + muttontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,394 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-nonanal (fatty, waxy).

  5. Veal + oniontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,841 recipes

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

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 dissolves gelatin into the broth as it simmers.
Scrag of veal
Adds body and gelatin from the bones and connective tissue, giving the broth more richness.
Scrag of mutton
Adds a deeper, richer meat flavor and more body to the broth.

Swap the onion

The recipe marks onion as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, veal, mutton):

  1. Onionthe original
  2. Tomatofits about as well
  3. Carrotfits about as well
  4. Leekfits less well

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

You might also like