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Noodle Soup

A hearty soup made with meat, bones, noodles, tomatoes, celery, bay leaves, and Campbell's Soup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,377 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Noodle 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 broth

  1. Combine the meat, bones, and water in a large pot.

  2. Bring the mixture to a boil.

  3. Add the bay leaves, salt, tomatoes, and celery.

  4. Simmer for 1-2 hours.

  5. Remove the meat and bones.

Finish the soup

  1. Add the noodles and cook until tender.

  2. Stir in the can of Campbell's Soup.

  3. Heat through 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.

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. Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

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

  2. Meat + tomatotop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,438 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  3. Meat + celerytop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,880 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Meat and bones
Release flavour and gelatin into the broth during the long simmer.
Noodles
Provide the starchy body and chew that make the dish a noodle soup.
Tomatoes
Add acidity and savoury depth to the broth.
Celery
Adds aromatic, vegetal flavour to the broth.
Campbell's soup
Adds ready-made savoury flavour and body to the finished soup.

The step that matters

Remove the meat and bones before adding the noodles. Leaving bones and meat in while the noodles cook can overcook the noodles and make the broth cloudy and greasy. Removing them first keeps the noodles tender and the broth clear.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, tomato):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Garlicfits about as well
  3. Corianderfits about as well
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, tomato. 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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