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Flour and Bread Soups

A thick soup made with beef fat, onions, flour, water, milk, and mashed potato, seasoned with salt and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and potato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Flour and Bread Soups

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Fry the onions in the beef fat until light brown, then remove and press out the fat.

  2. In the same fat, cook the flour until it turns yellow, then gradually add the water.

  3. Return the onions to the pot and let it stand for a while.

  4. Add the milk and mashed potato, then season with salt and pepper.

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. Onion + potatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  2. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  3. Beef + potatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,052 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  4. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  5. Milk + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef fat
Carries the onion flavour and gives the soup a rich, savoury base.
Flour
Cooked in the fat until yellow, it helps thicken the soup as the water is added.
Mashed potato
Adds body and starch, making the soup thicker and creamier.
Milk
Adds creaminess and mild sweetness to the soup.

The step that matters

Adding the water gradually to the flour. Adding liquid slowly to the cooked flour and fat lets the starch disperse evenly, which prevents lumps and helps the soup thicken smoothly.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, flour, milk, potato, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Chivefits about as well
  3. Carrotfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, flour, milk, potato, pepper. 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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