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Soup

Old-fashioned Mock Turtle

A rich soup of boiled head and beef neck with ham, vegetables, sherry and forcemeat balls, made to imitate turtle soup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and carrot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Old-fashioned Mock Turtle

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the head

  1. Remove the brain and wash the head thoroughly.

  2. Soak the head well.

  3. In a large pot, pour in 9 quarts of cold water and bring to a gentle boil.

  4. Skim the surface clean and boil the head for 1.5 hours.

Make the stock

  1. Remove the head and add the browned neck of beef, ham, onions, celery, carrots, sweet herbs, lemon rind, peppercorns, and salt to the pot.

  2. Stew gently for 7-8 hours, then strain the stock and cool it to remove the fat.

  3. Remove the skin and fat from the head, cutting into strips or dice.

Finish the soup

  1. In a large soup pot, combine 4-5 quarts of stock and bring to a boil.

  2. Mix 4 ounces of butter with 4 ounces of flour, then add to the boiling stock.

  3. Stir in mace and cayenne, adjusting to taste, then add sherry.

  4. Return the head to the pot and simmer for 1.25 to 1.5 hours, stirring often.

  5. Just before serving, add the forcemeat balls.

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 + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Celery + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,467 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Neck of beef
Releases flavour and body into the stock during long stewing.
Butter
Enriches the soup with fat and helps carry flavour.
Flour
Combined with butter, it thickens the stock to a fuller body.
Onions
Build the savoury, sweet base flavour of the stock.
Sherry
Adds acidity and aromatic depth at the end of cooking.
Forcemeat balls
Add tender, meaty texture to each serving.

The step that matters

Mixing the butter and flour into the boiling stock. Flour added directly to hot liquid can clump into lumps. Working the butter and flour into a smooth paste before adding it, and stirring well, helps the mixture thicken evenly.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, butter, ham, onion, celery, carrot, flour):

  1. Avocadofits about as well
  2. Lemonthe original
  3. Limefits about as well
  4. Coconutfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, butter, ham, onion, celery, carrot, flour. 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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