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Soup

Bouillon Aux Herbes

A clear broth made by simmering a mix of chopped leafy greens with butter, salt, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Chard and chervil share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and 7 recipes mention both. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

The recipe

Ingredients

Contains: milk (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

  1. Combine the sorrel, Swiss chard, lettuce, purslane, and chervil in a pot, then add the coarse sea salt, fresh butter, and water.

  2. Bring to a boil and reduce the liquid by half.

  3. Remove from heat and strain through a fine cloth or sieve.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Chard + cherviltop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together7 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Sorrel + purslanetop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together21 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Sorrel + cherviltop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together247 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Purslane + cherviltop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together21 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Sorrel + lettucetop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together317 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Sorrel leaves
Adds bright, sour flavor that gives the broth its lively acidity.
Swiss chard leaves
Contributes leafy body and vegetal flavor to the broth.
Lettuce leaves
Adds mild, delicate leafy flavor and soft body to the broth.
Purslane leaves
Adds tender leafy texture and a mild, slightly tart flavor.
Chervil leaves
Adds a delicate, aromatic anise-like fragrance to the broth.
Fresh butter
Adds fat that carries flavor and gives the broth a rounder mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Reducing the liquid by half. Boiling concentrates the flavors and thickens the liquid as water evaporates. Reducing too far can make the broth overly strong or salty, so watch it closely.

Flavor stand-ins for the chard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sorrel, lettuce, purslane, chervil, butter):

  1. Chivebetter flavor fit
  2. Beetrootbetter flavor fit
  3. Leekbetter flavor fit
  4. Chardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sorrel, lettuce, purslane, chervil, butter. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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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