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Scotch Barley Broth

A hearty broth made with Scotch barley, beef, onions, celery, turnip, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Barley and turnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 629 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Scotch Barley Broth

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the Scotch Barley in cold water.

  2. In a soup pot, combine the barley and beef pieces, covering with cold water.

Make the broth

  1. Bring to a boil, skim off any foam, and add the onions.

  2. Reduce heat and simmer gently for 2 hours.

  3. Skim off the fat, then add the celery and turnip.

  4. Season with salt and boil for another 1.5 hours.

Finish and serve

  1. Remove the meat carefully and keep warm.

  2. Skim the broth well before serving.

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. Barley + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together629 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Celery + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Onion + turniptop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Barley + celerytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together571 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol (clove, smoky).

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

Scotch barley
Thickens the broth as its starch releases during long simmering, giving body and a chewy texture.
Beef shin or leg
Long simmering breaks down connective tissue and releases gelatin and flavor into the broth.
Onions
Release sweetness and savory depth into the broth as they cook.
Celery
Adds aromatic, savory background flavor to the broth.
Turnip
Adds mild sweetness and a soft, tender texture to the soup.

The step that matters

Skim the fat and foam. Foam and fat rise to the surface during simmering and can make the broth greasy, cloudy and bitter. Removing them early and again before serving gives a clearer, cleaner-tasting soup.

Swap the onion

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against barley, beef, celery, turnip. 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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