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Brown Stock

A brown beef stock made with shin or shoulder, vegetables, peppercorns, celery, salt, and water, simmered for hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Brown Stock

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Measure the water into a strong pan and add the salt.

  2. Wipe and cut the meat into small pieces, removing fat and skin, and add to the water.

  3. Scrape the bone well, remove the marrow, wash to remove fat, and add to the pan.

Make the stock

  1. Bring the stock slowly to a boil, about 45 minutes.

  2. Remove any gray scum that forms on the surface.

  3. Add the prepared vegetables cut into large pieces.

  4. Simmer the stock for 3 to 4 hours.

  5. Strain through a fine sieve.

  6. When cold, skim off the fat.

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

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Beef + carrottop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,606 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Beef shin or shoulder
Provides meat flavour and gelatin-rich connective tissue that gives the stock body.
Bones (in the method)
Release collagen and marrow during long simmering, adding body and richness to the stock.
Onion
Adds savoury sweetness and aromatic depth as it cooks slowly in the liquid.

The step that matters

Removing the gray scum. Scum is coagulated protein and impurities that rise as the liquid heats. Skimming it early keeps the stock clear and clean-tasting rather than cloudy or bitter.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Turnipfits better
  3. Tomatofits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, carrot, celery. 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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