Why it works: Onion and turnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,585 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓
Veal Broth
Ingredients
Directions
Make the broth
Place the veal pieces in a stewpan and pour in the water.
Heat over medium heat and skim carefully.
Add the onion, turnip, mace, and salt.
Stew slowly for 2 hours.
Strain the broth through a sieve.
Finish and serve
Add the boiled rice and boil for an additional 10 minutes.
Serve hot.
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.
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Onion + turniptop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together7,585 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
-
Turnip + ricetop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together824 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
-
Onion + ricetop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together10,433 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
-
Onion + macetop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together7,078 recipes
Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).
-
Mace + ricetop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together932 recipes
Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Veal scrag
- Releases gelatin and flavour into the water, giving the broth body and savouriness.
- Rice
- Thickens the broth slightly as its starch softens during the final boil.
The step that matters
Skim carefully while heating. Skimming removes the grey foam of coagulated proteins and impurities that rise as the veal heats. Removing them keeps the broth clear and clean-tasting.
Swap the mace
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, onion, turnip, rice):
- Capersfits better
- Turmericfits better
- Celeryfits better
- Macethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against veal, onion, turnip, rice. 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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