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Cream Tomato Soup

A creamy tomato soup made with butter, flour, tomatoes, milk, and Worcestershire sauce, topped with whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Cream Tomato Soup

Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Cream Tomato Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup

  1. In a saucepan, blend together the butter and flour.

  2. Stir in the cooked and strained tomatoes mixed with baking soda.

  3. Add the boiling milk and season with salt, pepper, and Worcestershire sauce.

  4. Do not let the soup boil.

Serve

  1. Serve with whipped cream on top.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Sauce + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Enriches the base and carries flavour, with flour forming a roux that thickens the soup.
Flour
Thickens the soup into a smooth, creamy body when cooked with the butter.
Cooked and strained tomatoes
Provide the main tomato flavour, acidity and body of the soup.
Baking soda
Neutralises some of the tomato acidity, reducing the risk of curdling in the milk.
Milk
Adds richness and creaminess, giving the soup its smooth, mellow texture.

The step that matters

Do not let the soup boil. Once the boiling milk is added, high heat can make the proteins in milk curdle or separate, especially in an acidic tomato base. Keeping it hot but below a boil preserves a smooth, creamy texture.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, milk, pepper, sauce, cream):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, milk, pepper, sauce, 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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