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Meat with Barley

A stew of diced meat, onions, barley, and potatoes simmered in water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and potato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Meat with Barley

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a stewpan, combine the diced meat, chopped onions, and washed barley.

  2. Dredge with flour, salt, and pepper.

  3. Add water and simmer for 2 hours.

  4. Add the sliced potatoes and simmer for 1 hour longer.

  5. Adjust seasoning if necessary.

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 + potatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  2. Barley + potatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together165 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Pepper + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  4. Onion + barleytop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,166 recipes

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

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Barley
Thickens the broth as it cooks and gives the stew a chewy, hearty texture.
Meat
Provides savory depth and richness to the broth as it simmers.
Onions
Add sweetness and aroma that build the flavor base of the stew.
Flour
Coats the meat and helps thicken the liquid into a body-rich stew.
Potatoes
Add starch and soft body, thickening the stew while absorbing its flavors.

The step that matters

Adding the potatoes late. Potatoes added at the start would break down during the long simmer, turning mushy and clouding the broth. Adding them for the final hour keeps their shape while they still absorb flavor.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, barley, flour, pepper, potato):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, barley, flour, pepper, potato. 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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