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Scots Kale

A hearty stew of barley, beef, kale, and optional leeks simmered together.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Barley and leek match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 142 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-ol, which smells mushroom, earthy. The science ↓

Scots Kale

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup

  1. Put the barley in cold water and bring to a boil.

  2. Skim off the scum, then add the fresh beef and salt.

  3. Boil for three hours.

Add the greens

  1. In the meantime, boil the kale until tender.

  2. If desired, add the leeks with the greens for flavor.

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 + leektop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together142 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  2. Kale + leektop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Barley + beeftop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together458 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  4. Barley + kaletop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Beef + leektop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together659 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl butyrate (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Barley
Releases starch as it simmers, thickening the broth and giving it body.
Beef
Long simmering draws savoury flavour and richness from the meat into the broth.
Kale
Turns tender when boiled, adding earthy flavour and bulk to the soup.
Leeks
Add a mild, sweet onion-like aroma when cooked with the greens.

The step that matters

Skim off the scum before adding the beef and salt. Scum is coagulated protein and impurities that rise to the surface. Removing it early keeps the broth clear and clean-tasting, so the beef and barley flavour comes through without a bitter or muddy edge.

Swap the leek

The recipe marks leek as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (barley, beef, kale):

  1. Turnipfits about as well
  2. Leekthe original
  3. Chivefits about as well
  4. Shallotfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against barley, beef, kale. 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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