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Portable Soup

A soup made from calves' feet and beef leg, thickened with egg whites and dried into cakes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,012 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Portable Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Boil the calves' feet and leg of beef in enough water for 2 hours, skimming off any foam.

  2. Strain the soup to separate it from the meat.

  3. Boil the meat again in fresh water with celery and pepper for flavor.

  4. Combine the two broths.

  5. Let the combined broth cool to allow the fat to congeal.

  6. Remove the congealed fat.

Clarify and reduce

  1. Mix the broth with the egg whites.

  2. Boil the mixture again, skimming off any foam.

  3. Strain the broth through a flannel.

  4. Reduce the strained broth to a thick paste, stirring constantly.

Shape and dry

  1. Spread the paste on smooth stones.

  2. Pour the paste into molds to shape.

  3. Dry the cakes in a stove until brittle.

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. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

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

  3. Beef + celerytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,370 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Beef + eggtop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Pepper + eggtop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together50,580 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Pepper and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 50,580 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Calves' feet
Release gelatin and body into the broth, giving the finished paste its firmness.
Leg of beef
Adds meat flavor and richness to the broth as it simmers.
Egg whites
Bind to impurities so they can be skimmed and strained out, leaving a clearer broth.

The step that matters

Reduce the strained broth to a thick paste, stirring constantly. Concentrated gelatin and sugars scorch easily on the bottom of the pan. Constant stirring spreads the heat evenly and keeps the paste from burning or sticking.

Swap the celery

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

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Nutmegfits about as well
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pepper, egg. 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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