Name: Whole Beef-Tea
Ingredients: ½ pound fresh beef, cut into 1-inch pieces; 1½ cups water; 1 piece of green celery stalk (optional); 1 small onion (optional); a few cloves (optional); Worcestershire sauce (to taste)

Why it works: Celery and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,668 recipes. Both carry gamma-decalactone, which smells peach, creamy. The science ↓

Whole Beef-Tea

Ingredients

½ pound fresh beef, cut into 1-inch pieces
1½ cups water
1 piece of green celery stalk (optional)
1 small onion (optional)
a few cloves (optional)
Worcestershire sauce (to taste)

Directions

Prepare the beef

Remove all fat and skin from the beef and cut it into 1-inch pieces.
Place the beef in ½ cup of cold water and let it sit for a few hours or overnight.

Simmer and strain

After soaking, transfer the beef and water to a saucepan with 1 cup of additional water.
Simmer for 2 hours, then strain the liquid into a bowl.
Chop or pound the beef finely and add it back to the strained beef-tea.
For flavor, add a piece of celery, onion, cloves, and Worcestershire sauce to taste.

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.

Celery + clovetop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together4,668 recipes

Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).
Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together17,092 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Celery + oniontop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,518 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Onion + clovetop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together16,901 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).
Beef + celerytop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,370 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

Beef: Provides the meaty flavor and dissolved proteins that give the broth its body.
Water: Acts as the solvent that draws flavor and gelatin out of the beef during soaking and simmering.