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Chinese

Seaweed Soup

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Seaweed and vinegar work together. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and 66 recipes mention both. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

The recipe

Ingredients

Contains: egg, wheat (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Step-by-step directions aren't available for this recipe.

Recipe from a historical cookbook.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Seaweed + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together66 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Water chestnut + flourtop 5% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together53 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Egg + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together104,138 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Chicken + water chestnuttop 9% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together204 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

  5. Seaweed + chickentop 12% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together23 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-butanedione (buttery, creamy).

Egg and flour share little aroma chemistry, yet 104,138 recipes mention both: they likely work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

Flavor stand-ins for the water chestnut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, seaweed, chicken, flour, vinegar):

  1. Avocadobetter flavor fit
  2. Lemonbetter flavor fit
  3. Pumpkinabout as good a flavor fit
  4. Water chestnutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, seaweed, chicken, flour, vinegar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).