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To Make a Common Peas Soup

A hearty soup made from split peas, water, bacon or beef bones, celery, turnip, flour, salt, pepper, and fried bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and turnip are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,418 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

To Make a Common Peas Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Combine split peas and soft water in a pot.

  2. Add lean bacon or roast beef bones.

  3. Wash and chop the celery and turnip, then add to the pot.

Make the soup

  1. Boil until reduced to 2 quarts.

  2. Strain the mixture through a colander using a wooden spoon.

  3. Mix flour with water and add to the soup, boiling well.

  4. Slice another head of celery.

  5. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Serve

  1. Cut bread into small dice, fry until light brown, and place in a dish.

  2. Pour the soup over the fried bread.

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. Celery + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

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

  3. Turnip + flourtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Peas + turniptop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,350 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 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

Split peas
Form the body of the soup as they break down during boiling.
Celery
Adds aromatic flavor to the soup base.
Turnip
Adds subtle sweetness and body to the soup.
Flour
Thickens the soup as it boils.
Bread
Browns in frying to give crisp, toasted pieces that hold up in the soup.

The step that matters

Boil until reduced to 2 quarts. Boiling concentrates the liquid and softens the peas. Stopping too early leaves a thin soup, while over-reducing makes it too thick and salty once seasoned.

Swap the peas

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, celery, turnip, flour, pepper, bread):

  1. Lentilsfits better
  2. Chestnutfits better
  3. Beansfits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, celery, turnip, flour, pepper, bread. 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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