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White Stock

A clear stock made by simmering veal, rabbit, or fowl bones with onion, mace, peppercorns, celery, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,518 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

White Stock

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Break the bones and remove all the fat.

  2. Cut the meat into small pieces and place in a pan with the salt and cold water.

Make the stock

  1. Bring slowly to a boil, skimming thoroughly.

  2. Add the onion, mace, peppercorns, and celery.

  3. Allow to simmer gently for 4 to 5 hours.

Strain and skim

  1. Strain the stock and let it cool.

  2. Remove the fat from the top.

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. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Onion + macetop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,078 recipes

    Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).

  3. Mace + celerytop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,769 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  4. Veal + oniontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,841 recipes

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

  5. Veal + macetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,761 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

Knuckle bones
Release gelatin and body into the water, giving the stock a rich, full texture.
Water
Acts as the cooking liquid that extracts flavour and gelatin from the bones and meat.
Onion
Adds aromatic sweetness and savoury depth to the simmering liquid.
Celery
Contributes gentle aromatic flavour to the stock during simmering.

The step that matters

Skimming while bringing to a boil. Impurities and coagulated proteins rise as foam when the liquid heats. Skimming them early keeps the stock clear and free of off flavours, and removing fat later keeps it clean-tasting.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, onion, celery):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Garlicfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, onion, celery. 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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