Name: Another Kind of Mutton Broth
Ingredients: 1 pound meat (beef, veal, or mutton); 1 quart water; parsley root (about the size of two fingers); 1 small carrot; 1-2 onions; 1 blade of mace; 2 ounces clean bacon (optional)

Why it works: Parsley and carrot 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 ↓

Another Kind of Mutton Broth

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Wash the meat in boiling water and dry it with a cloth.
Place the meat in a pot with 1 quart of water and bring to a boil.

Simmer and skim

Skim the surface to remove scum, then add a little cold water to help it rise again.
Add parsley root, carrot, onions, mace, and bacon if desired.
Boil for at least 1.5 hours until the meat is tender.

Serve

Strain the broth before serving.

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.

Parsley + carrottop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together8,053 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together21,601 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together25,843 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Carrot + macetop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,592 recipes

Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
Parsley + macetop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,268 recipes

Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

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

What each ingredient does

Meat: Gives the broth its main flavour and body as it cooks slowly in water.
Onions: Add savoury sweetness and aroma to the broth as they cook.
Bacon: Adds smoky, salty fat that enriches the broth's flavour.

The step that matters

Skimming the surface. Scum rises as the liquid heats and can cloud the broth and taint its flavour. Removing it while the pot is just coming to a boil keeps the broth clear and clean-tasting.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, parsley, carrot, onion):

Thymefits better
Celeryfits better
Marjoramfits better
Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, parsley, carrot, onion. 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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Another Kind of Mutton Broth