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Cream of Tomato Soup

A tomato soup thickened with a butter‑flour roux and finished with milk, parsley, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Cream of Tomato Soup

Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and 34,122 recipes mention both. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Cream of Tomato Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the tomatoes

  1. In a stew pan, combine the canned tomatoes, bay leaf, and mace. Cover and simmer slowly for 15 minutes.

  2. Strain the tomatoes into a soup tureen, then add sugar, baking soda, salt, and pepper.

Make the cream

  1. In a double boiler, heat the milk.

  2. In a separate bowl, rub together the butter and flour, adding a little hot milk until smooth.

  3. Pour the butter-flour mixture into the hot milk, stirring continuously until it thickens.

Combine and serve

  1. Pour in the creamy mixture all at once, stirring gently until well blended.

  2. Sprinkle chopped parsley on top and 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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together17,923 recipes

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

  4. Tomato + parsleytop 8% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together5,398 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour share little aroma chemistry, yet 124,287 recipes mention both: they likely 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

Canned tomatoes
Provide the main body, acidity and flavour of the soup.
Milk
Forms the creamy base that gives the soup its smooth, rich body.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and combines with flour to form a roux.
Flour
Thickens the cream mixture as it cooks, giving the soup body.
Baking soda
Neutralises some tomato acidity, softening the sharp taste.

The step that matters

Pour in the creamy mixture all at once, stirring gently until well blended.. Adding the milk-flour mixture to hot tomatoes all at once and stirring helps it blend evenly without lumps. Tomatoes are acidic and can cause dairy to curdle if the mixture is added too slowly or left to overheat.

Flavor stand-ins for the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, butter, flour, sugar, pepper, milk, parsley):

  1. Cinnamonbetter flavor fit
  2. Thymebetter flavor fit
  3. Cardamombetter flavor fit
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, butter, flour, sugar, pepper, milk, parsley. 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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