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Greex Pea Soup

A soup made from green peas, lard, milk, flour, onions, egg yolks, and cream, seasoned with salt and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter 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 ↓

Greex Pea Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup base

  1. Heat the lard in a kettle.

  2. Add the peas and stir until they are perfectly green.

  3. Season with salt and pepper, then pour in enough water to make soup.

  4. Boil for 45 minutes.

Thicken and finish

  1. Mix the milk with the flour to thicken it, then add to the soup.

  2. Fry the chopped onions in butter until light brown, then add to the soup.

  3. Just before serving, stir in the beaten egg yolks mixed with a little cream.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Peas + oniontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,460 recipes

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

Flour and butter 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

Green peas
Provide the main body and vegetable flavour of the soup.
Milk
Adds creaminess and softens the soup's flavour when thickened.
Flour
Thickens the milk so it gives the soup body without lumps.
Egg yolks
Enrich and thicken the soup for a smooth, velvety texture.
Young onions
Add savoury aroma and flavour once fried until light brown.

The step that matters

Adding the egg yolks. Egg yolks thicken when heated gently but can curdle or scramble if the soup is too hot or boiling. Stirring them in just before serving, off the boil, keeps the soup smooth.

Swap the peas

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

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Chestnutfits better
  3. Pistachiofits better
  4. Peasthe original

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