Why it works: Beans and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,733 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓
Bean Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the beans
Rinse the beans and soak them in water with baking soda until the hulls easily slip off.
Rub the beans in cold water to remove the hulls, draining and repeating until all hulls are gone.
Make the soup
In a pot, combine the beans and 2 quarts of water, and boil until the beans are perfectly smooth.
If using meat, add it to the pot while boiling.
If not, mix butter and flour together and add to the soup.
Serve
Place well toasted bread in a tureen, pour the soup over it, and season with salt and pepper.
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.
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Beans + peppertop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,733 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Meat + breadtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,924 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Beans + breadtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together332 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Beans + meattop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together369 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3,5-trimethylpyrazine (cocoa, roasted).
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Pepper + breadtop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together20,964 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Beans
- Form the body of the soup; boiling until smooth breaks them down into a thick, creamy texture.
- Baking soda
- Softens the bean hulls so they slip off easily during soaking.
- Butter and flour
- Used instead of meat; the flour and butter thicken and enrich the soup.
The step that matters
Removing the hulls. Hulls left on the beans stay tough and gritty in the finished soup. Rubbing in cold water and repeating until every hull is gone keeps the texture smooth.
Swap the beans
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, pepper, bread):
- Beansthe original
- Lima beansfits about as well
- Walnutfits about as well
- Peasfits about as well
Fit is the average pairing score against meat, pepper, bread. 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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