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Mutton Broth

A clear broth made by simmering mutton neck, herbs, onions, turnips, and barley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Mutton Broth

Why it works: Turnip and chive match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 109 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Mutton Broth

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Cut the neck of mutton in two and boil the scrag in a gallon of water, skimming well.

  2. Add the sweet herbs, crust of bread, and onion, and let it boil for 1 hour.

  3. Add pearl barley at the beginning for extra flavor.

Finish and season

  1. Add the other half of the mutton, turnips, marigolds, chives, and parsley 10 minutes before it's done.

  2. Season with salt.

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. Turnip + chivetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together109 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Turnip + barleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together629 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Turnip + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,842 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Chive + parsleytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,150 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Onion + chivetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,907 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Neck of mutton
Gives the broth its main meaty flavor and body as it simmers.
Pearl barley
Thickens the broth slightly and adds a soft, starchy texture.
Turnips
Add mild sweetness and earthy flavor to the broth.
Onion
Adds savory aroma and depth to the broth.

The step that matters

Skimming the scrag broth. Skimming foam and fat as the meat first boils removes impurities that would otherwise cloud the broth and taste greasy, giving a cleaner, clearer result.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, bread, turnip, chive, parsley, barley):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, bread, turnip, chive, parsley, barley. 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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