Skip to main content
Main

Ox-cheek Soup

A hearty soup made with ox cheek, vegetables, herbs, and a roux thickener.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Ox-cheek Soup

Why it works: Thyme and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,225 recipes. Both carry terpineol, which smells pine, woody. The science ↓

Ox-cheek Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the ox-cheek in salt and warm water for 5 to 6 hours, changing the water 2 to 3 times.

  2. Prepare the vegetables by cutting them into thick slices.

  3. Melt the butter in a large stewpan, add the vegetables, and fry until brown.

  4. Wash the ox-cheek well, break the bones into small pieces, and add them to the stewpan.

Make the soup

  1. Add the bouquet garni, peppercorns, cloves, mace, and water to the stewpan.

  2. Bring the mixture slowly to a boil, skim well, cover, and simmer gently for 3 hours.

  3. Strain the soup, return it to the saucepan, and bring to a boil again.

  4. Mix the flour smoothly with a little cold water or stock, pour it into the soup, stir, and simmer for 5 to 6 minutes.

Finish and serve

  1. Cut the smaller pieces of meat into dice and add them to the soup, along with diced cooked celery and carrot.

  2. Season to taste and serve.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Thyme + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  2. Basil + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together688 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  3. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Parsley + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Ox-cheek
Breaks down during long simmering to give the soup rich body and meaty flavor.
Butter
Fat that carries the frying flavor of the browned vegetables into the soup.
Flour
Starch that thickens the strained soup as it simmers.
Onions
Browned in butter to add deep, sweet savory flavor to the stock.

The step that matters

Frying the vegetables until brown. Browning caramelizes the sugars and forms savory compounds through the Maillard reaction, adding color and depth to the stock. Pale vegetables give a flat, washed-out soup.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (carrot, turnip, celery, parsley, thyme, basil, marjoram):

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against carrot, turnip, celery, parsley, thyme, basil, marjoram. 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.

You might also like

Carrot SoupCarrot Soup134 recipesCream of Celery SoupCream of Celery Soup113 recipesTurnip SoupTurnip Soup43 recipesCelery StewCelery Stew25 recipes