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Scotch Mutton Broth

A hearty mutton broth with barley, carrots, turnips, onions, and parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,053 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Scotch Mutton Broth

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. In a stewpan, combine the scrag of mutton with 3 quarts of water and bring to a boil.

  2. Skim the surface well, then reduce heat and simmer for 1.5 hours.

  3. Add the cutlets of mutton, removing excess fat, and skim again when the meat boils, then every 10 minutes.

  4. Add the carrots, turnips, and onions to the broth, ensuring they cook thoroughly.

  5. Stir in the barley and season with coarse sea salt to taste.

  6. Let the mixture stew together for 3.5 hours.

  7. About 30 minutes before serving, add the chopped parsley.

Serve

  1. Cut the meat from the scrag into small pieces and serve in a tureen with the soup.

  2. Serve the remaining mutton on a separate dish with whole boiled turnips around it.

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. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

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

  2. Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Turnip + barleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together629 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Turnip + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,842 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Turnip + oniontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Mutton
Gives the broth its rich meaty flavour and gelatin-based body as it simmers.
Barley
Releases starch as it cooks, thickening the broth and adding a soft, chewy texture.
Carrots
Add natural sweetness and body to the broth as they soften during long simmering.
Turnips
Soften during simmering, adding a mildly sweet, earthy flavour to the broth.
Onions
Build savoury depth in the broth as they break down during long cooking.

The step that matters

Skimming the surface. Skimming removes foam and coagulated proteins that would otherwise cloud the broth and give it a scummy taste. Doing it early and at regular intervals keeps the broth clear and clean-flavoured.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, carrot, turnip, barley, parsley):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Parsnipfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, carrot, turnip, barley, parsley. 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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