Name: Soup Made of Greens with Barley or Rice
Ingredients: greens; ½ cup barley or rice; dried peas; dried beans; dried lentils; water; salt

Why it works: Beans and lentils match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 135 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Soup Made of Greens with Barley or Rice

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the legumes

Soak dried peas, beans, or lentils for 10 hours.
Combine soaked legumes with water in a pot.
Cook for 10 hours.

Finish the soup

Add greens and barley or rice to the pot.
Cook until tender.
Season with salt to taste.

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.

Beans + lentilstop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together135 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Barley + beanstop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together106 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
Barley + lentilstop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together57 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Peas + beanstop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together949 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
Peas + lentilstop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together164 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Dried peas: Provide body and protein-rich substance that thickens the soup as they break down.
Dried beans: Add body and a hearty texture as they soften during long cooking.
Dried lentils: Break down during long cooking to thicken the broth and add texture.
Barley or rice: Adds chewy texture and thickens the soup as the starch releases during cooking.
Greens: Add fresh flavor and color, wilting to tender pieces in the hot broth.