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Another Receipt for Gravy Soup

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 68,474 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Another Receipt for Gravy Soup

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a deep stewpan, combine the meat, onions, carrots, and bouillon.

  2. Set over a brisk fire until the broth reduces and forms a glaze at the bottom.

  3. Add the proper amount of water and finish the soup as per the previous instructions.

  4. Dredge the meat with flour, season with pepper and salt, and fry until clear brown.

  5. Stew the meat for six hours with 1 pint of water for each pound of meat and the vegetables.

  6. Add the fried onions to every 3 quarts of soup.

  7. Strain the soup and remove excess fat.

  8. Thicken the soup with 6 ounces of butter mixed smoothly with 5 ounces of flour.

  9. After 20 minutes, stir in the soy sauce, sherry, and a little cayenne.

  10. Serve the soup hot.

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. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Butter + sherrytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,505 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Onion + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, flour, pepper, butter, sauce, sherry):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, flour, pepper, butter, sauce, sherry. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

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