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Mutton- Stock Fob Soups

A hearty stock made from beef, mutton, and various vegetables, simmered for hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and parsley 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 ↓

Mutton- Stock Fob Soups

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Combine equal parts of beef and mutton with a small portion of ham or lean bacon.

  2. Add necks of fowl, bones of an undressed calf's head, or any uncooked joint if desired.

  3. Pour 1 to 1½ gallons of cold water for each pound of meat.

Simmer

  1. Skim the liquid as it begins to boil.

  2. Add 1½ oz of coarse sea salt, 2 small heads of celery, 3 onions, 3 turnips, as many carrots, a bunch of thyme and parsley, ½ teaspoon of white peppercorns, 12 cloves, and a large blade of mace.

  3. Reduce heat and simmer gently for about 6 hours.

Strain and serve

  1. Strain the stock and set aside for use.

  2. Remove all fat before serving.

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. Thyme + parsleytop 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 + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  4. Turnip + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Collagen in the connective tissue breaks down into gelatin, giving the stock body and mouthfeel.
Mutton
Provides the stock's principal meaty, savoury flavour and additional gelatin for body.
Onions
Release sugars and aromatic compounds as they simmer, building a sweet, savoury background.
Carrots
Add gentle sweetness and a warm colour to the broth.
Celery
Contributes fresh, savoury aromatic notes that round out the flavour.

The step that matters

Simmer gently rather than boiling. A gentle simmer lets fat and impurities rise to be skimmed and keeps the stock clear. A hard boil agitates the liquid, emulsifying fat and particles into the broth so it turns cloudy and greasy.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, mutton, turnip, carrot, celery, thyme, parsley):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, mutton, turnip, carrot, celery, thyme, parsley. 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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