Why it works: Beef and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 31% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,305 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Sago Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Make the broth
Boil the beef in enough water to cover it until the essence is extracted.
Strain the broth.
Cook the sago
Add the sago to the broth.
Boil gently for one hour, ensuring the sago does not become too soft.
Finish and serve
Beat the egg yolks.
Pour the beaten yolks into a soup tureen.
Gradually pour the soup into the tureen.
Stir gently.
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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Beef + eggtop 31% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,305 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
- Beef
- Gives the broth its meaty flavor and body as it simmers.
- Sago
- Swells as it cooks, thickening the soup and giving it a soft, chewy texture.
- Egg yolks
- Enrich the soup with richness and help it turn smooth and creamy when stirred in.
The step that matters
Boil gently for one hour without letting the sago over-soften. Sago starch keeps swelling while it cooks. Too vigorous a boil or too long a simmer breaks the grains down, so the soup turns gluey instead of holding distinct, tender pearls.
“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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