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Consommé

A clear broth made from beef, veal, chicken, and vegetables, clarified with egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Consommé

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the meat

  1. Spread the bottom of a soup kettle with butter and cover it with raw ham.

  2. Add the beef, veal, and chicken pieces, then pour in the cold water.

  3. Set the kettle over medium heat and let it boil slowly until the water evaporates and a rich brown gravy forms at the bottom. Stir frequently to prevent burning.

  4. Once the water has boiled away, add enough cold water to cover the meat.

Make the broth

  1. Add the salt, carrot, turnip, celery root, onions, and bouquet of herbs.

  2. Cover the kettle tightly and let it boil slowly until the meat separates from the bone.

  3. Remove the meat and strain the broth, discarding any fat.

  4. Return the broth to the kettle.

Clarify and finish

  1. Beat the whites of 3 eggs to a stiff froth, mix with ½ cup cold water, and add to the soup.

  2. Stir and boil for 5 minutes, then let it sit off the heat for 10 minutes.

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 + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Turnip + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Beef + chickentop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,148 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  5. Beef + carrottop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,606 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

Beef
Breaks down into rich flavor and body in the broth as it simmers.
Veal
Adds gelatin from the bones and meat, giving the broth body and a fuller mouthfeel.
Chicken
Contributes savory flavor and gelatin to the broth as it cooks slowly.
Egg whites
Trap suspended particles as they cook, clarifying the broth into a clear liquid.

The step that matters

Boiling the water down to a brown gravy. The meat must brown and stick lightly at the bottom while water evaporates. Stirring prevents scorching, which would make the consommé taste bitter. Browning adds deep, roasted flavor to the final broth.

Swap the turnip

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, veal, chicken, butter, ham, carrot, celery):

  1. Onionfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Turnipthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, veal, chicken, butter, ham, carrot, celery. 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.

More consommé recipes

Chicken 21Veal 18Soup 15Vegetable 11Rice 8Custard 7 See all 50 →

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