Name: Stock, and Clear Soups
Ingredients: 5 ounces onions, chopped; 5 ounces carrots, chopped; 5 ounces celery, chopped; 1 clove garlic; 1 sprig thyme; 1 bay leaf; 1 bouquet garni (parsley, thyme, bay leaf tied together); water

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 ↓

Stock, and Clear Soups

Ingredients

Directions

In a stock pot, combine chopped onions, carrots, celery, and water.
Add the garlic clove and bouquet garni.
Bring to a simmer, keeping the water below boiling point.
Once bubbling resumes, reduce heat to maintain a gentle simmer.
Cook for 3 to 4 hours until the meat is thoroughly done.
Remove the vegetables and bouquet garni from the pot.
Use the cooked vegetables in a salad or puree for another dish.

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.

Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together9,057 recipes

Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together8,053 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together10,173 recipes

Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together29,058 recipes

Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).
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

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, carrot, celery, garlic, thyme, parsley):

Marjoramfits better
Winter savoryfits better
Cuminfits better
Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, carrot, celery, garlic, thyme, parsley. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.