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Scotch Broth

A hearty soup made with mutton, barley, onion, carrot, thyme, and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Scotch Broth

Why it works: Clove and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,108 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Scotch Broth

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. In a large pot, combine the mutton, barley, onion, carrot, and thyme.

  2. Cook until the meat is tender.

  3. Remove the meat and onion from the pot.

Finish and serve

  1. Cut the meat into small cubes and return it to the soup.

  2. Stir well and before serving, mix in the cream or milk and cream.

  3. Serve immediately.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Clove + thymetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,108 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Carrot + thymetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Barley + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together784 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

Neck of mutton
Gives the broth its main meaty flavour and, as it cooks slowly, becomes tender enough to cube.
Barley
Releases starch as it simmers, thickening the broth and giving it body.
Cream or milk
Adds richness and a smooth, mellow texture to the finished broth.

The step that matters

Cook until the meat is tender. Neck of mutton is a tough cut with a lot of connective tissue. It needs a long, gentle simmer so that the collagen breaks down into gelatin, which makes the meat tender and gives the broth body. Boiling it hard can toughen the meat.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, barley, onion, carrot, thyme, cream):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, barley, onion, carrot, thyme, cream. 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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