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Vegetable Soup

A simple boiled vegetable soup with potatoes, carrots, onions, celery, seasoned with salt and pepper, finished with butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Vegetable Soup

Why it works: Carrot and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Vegetable Soup

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Make the soup

  1. In a large pot, bring 1 quart of water to a boil.

  2. Add the diced potatoes, carrots, onions, and celery.

  3. Season with salt and pepper.

  4. Simmer until the vegetables are tender, about 20 minutes.

Finish and serve

  1. Stir in the butter before serving.

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 their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  3. Potato + carrottop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,107 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  4. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  5. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Break down slightly as they cook, giving the soup body and a starchy thickness.
Carrots
Hold their shape while softening, adding sweetness and color to the broth.
Onions
Soften and release sweet aromatic flavor into the broth as they simmer.
Celery
Contributes savory aroma and a mild crisp-tender texture to the soup.
Butter
Stirred in at the end to add richness and a smooth, rounded mouthfeel.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, carrot, celery, pepper, butter):

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Leekfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, carrot, celery, pepper, butter. 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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