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Stock for Clear Soup

A clear stock made from beef, veal, carrots, turnip, onion, shallot, garlic, parsley, thyme, mace, cloves, and peppercorns.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and garlic match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 29,058 recipes. Both carry furaneol, which smells caramel, strawberry. The science ↓

Stock for Clear Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the beef and veal into large pieces.

  2. Place the meat in a large pot and cover with water.

  3. Add the carrots, turnip, onion, shallot, garlic, parsley, thyme, mace, cloves, and peppercorns.

Simmer

  1. Bring to a simmer over medium heat.

  2. Allow to simmer gently for several hours, skimming off any fat that rises to the surface.

Strain and chill

  1. Once done, strain the stock and let it cool.

  2. Refrigerate overnight to allow the fat to solidify for easy removal.

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 + garlictop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together29,058 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Turnip + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together202 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Shallot + garlictop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,000 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Carrot + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,873 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Provides the meat flavor and gelatin-rich connective tissue that gives body to the stock.
Veal knuckle
Adds collagen from bone and connective tissue, giving the stock a fuller body and mouthfeel.
Carrots
Contribute natural sweetness and aromatic depth to the stock's flavor.
Onion
Adds savory sweetness and aroma as it softens and releases flavor into the liquid.

The step that matters

Gentle simmer with skimming. A hard boil emulsifies fat into the liquid and clouds the stock. A gentle simmer, with fat skimmed from the surface, keeps the stock clear and easier to strain.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, veal, carrot, turnip, onion, shallot, garlic):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, veal, carrot, turnip, onion, shallot, garlic. 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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