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A Rich English Brown Gravy

A gravy made with diced ham, beef neck, eschalots or onion, water or broth, spices, herbs, carrot, celery, and optional mushrooms.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,451 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

A Rich English Brown Gravy

Ingredients

Directions

Brown the meats

  1. Brown the diced ham lightly in a pan.

  2. Remove the ham from the pan.

  3. Fry the neck of beef in the same pan until done.

  4. Add the cooked beef over the ham.

  5. Brown gently.

Simmer the gravy

  1. Add the eschalots or onion.

  2. Pour in the boiling water or broth.

  3. Bring to a slow boil.

  4. Skim off any scum.

  5. Add salt, cloves, mace, peppercorns, savory herbs, carrot, and celery.

  6. Boil softly until reduced to about 1 pint.

  7. Strain the gravy.

Finish the gravy

  1. Let the gravy cool to remove fat.

  2. Reheat the gravy.

  3. Adjust seasoning with more salt and flavorings as needed.

  4. Optionally add mushrooms or morels at the beginning for extra 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. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Clove + carrottop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,873 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Pepper + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Clove + macetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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

What each ingredient does

Neck of beef
Provides rich meaty flavor and body as it cooks down into the broth.
Lean ham
Adds savory, salty depth from browning in the pan.
Eschalots or onion
Contributes sweetness and aromatic flavor to the stock.
Boiling water or weak broth
Forms the liquid base that extracts flavor from the meat and vegetables.
Carrot
Adds subtle sweetness and body to the simmered gravy.
Celery
Adds aromatic, vegetal background flavor to the gravy.

The step that matters

Skim off any scum. Scum rising during the slow boil contains coagulated proteins and impurities that would cloud the gravy and taste harsh if left in.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Celeryfits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, beef, flour, pepper, onion, clove, carrot. 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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