Why it works: Chicken and beef match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,148 recipes. Both carry 2-furfurylthiol, which smells coffee, roasted. The science ↓
Chicken Soup with Beef Extract
Ingredients
Directions
Heat the chicken stock in a pot until it reaches a boiling point.
Add the beef extract, cream, salt, and pepper to the boiling stock.
Stir well and serve hot.
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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Chicken + beeftop 4% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together2,148 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).
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Pepper + beeftop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together18,971 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Chicken + peppertop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together19,958 recipes
Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).
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Pepper + creamtop 23% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together21,449 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
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Chicken + creamtop 23% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together6,241 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Pepper and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 21,449 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Chicken stock
- Forms the liquid base of the soup and carries its savory flavor.
- Beef extract
- Adds concentrated savory, meaty depth to the broth.
- Cream
- Adds richness and a smoother, rounder mouthfeel to the soup.
The step that matters
Adding the cream to the boiling stock. Dairy cream can curdle or separate when it meets very hot, boiling liquid, especially if the stock is acidic or the cream is cold. Adding it as the stock is just off the boil and stirring steadily helps keep the soup smooth.
“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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