Why it works: Carrot and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 21,601 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓
Carrot Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Cook the carrots
Wash, scrape, and slice the carrots.
Boil the carrots in water or stock until tender, about 1 hour for young carrots.
Strain
Place a clean sieve over a large bowl and pour the contents of the saucepan into the sieve.
Rub the carrots through the sieve with the back of a wooden spoon, using some soup to help.
Discard any hard, stringy parts left in the sieve.
Finish
Return the soup to the saucepan and bring to a boil.
If the soup is not as thick as cream, thicken it with flour or corn flour.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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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Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together21,601 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
- Carrots
- Form the main body of the soup and provide its natural sweetness and colour.
- Water or stock
- Forms the liquid base that cooks the carrots and carries their flavour.
- Flour or corn flour (in the method)
- Starch thickens the soup when heated with liquid, giving it a creamier body.
The step that matters
Rubbing the carrots through the sieve. Pressing the cooked carrots breaks their cell walls into a smooth purée and releases starch, which gives the soup its body. Leaving lumps or skipping the sieve results in a coarse, thin texture.
“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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