Name: Clear Soup with Quenelles
Ingredients: 1 pound veal stock meat; ¼ pound veal bones; 5 ounces lean uncooked veal; 3 ounces panada; 3 ounces veal udder or butter; 2 egg yolks; ½ teaspoon coarse sea salt; ½ teaspoon spiced pepper; milk (as needed)

Why it works: Veal and meat are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,890 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Clear Soup with Quenelles

Ingredients

Directions

Make the bouillon

Make a bright, clear bouillon using the proper amount of vegetables.
Add veal stock meat and veal bones for additional strength.

Make the quenelle mixture

Mince the veal and pound it into a paste.
Gradually mix in the panada.
Add the veal udder or butter.
Continue pounding and add the egg yolks, salt, and spiced pepper.
Pass the mixture through a fine sieve into a clean bowl.
Stir for 5 minutes and test by dropping a small piece into boiling water.
Adjust consistency with milk or panada as needed.

Shape, poach and serve

Form olive-shaped quenelles using two teaspoons.
Poach the quenelles in stock or water.
Drain the quenelles and add them to the soup.

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.

Veal + meattop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,890 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together88,785 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Meat + milktop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,703 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Meat + peppertop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together8,777 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Veal + peppertop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together10,049 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

Lean veal: Provides the main meaty body that the quenelle mixture is built from.
Panada: Adds starch and moisture, helping the quenelle mixture stay tender and hold together.
Veal udder or butter: Adds fat, which keeps the quenelles soft and moist after cooking.
Egg yolks: Bind the mixture so the quenelles set firmly when poached.

The step that matters

Stirring and testing the mixture before shaping. Pounding and stirring develop a smooth, cohesive paste. If the mixture is too wet it will not hold its shape, and if too stiff the quenelles turn dense. The small test poach shows whether the texture is right before the whole batch is shaped and cooked.

“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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Clear Soup with Quenelles