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Thai Coconut Soup

Take-out tonight? Nope! Instead of ordering in try this quick homemade Thai coconut soup at home. This yummy soup is a replica of the coconut curry soup I order at a local Thai restaurant. Flavorful yet light at the same time.

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Why it works: Ginger and coconut match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and 1,168 recipes mention both. Both carry isoamyl acetate, which smells banana, pear. The science ↓

The recipe

Serves 4
Prep10 min
Cook25 min

Ingredients

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

Directions

Method written by CompKitchen from the ingredient list. Not the original author's method, not kitchen-tested.

  1. Heat the olive oil in a large pot over medium heat. Add the sliced carrots and cook for 4 minutes, stirring occasionally.

  2. Add the minced garlic and ginger and stir for 1 minute until fragrant. Stir in the red curry paste and cook for 1 minute more.

  3. Pour in the chicken broth and add the fish sauce. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat and simmer for 5 minutes.

  4. Add the shiitake mushrooms and simmer for 5 minutes until the mushrooms and carrots are tender.

  5. Stir in the coconut milk and sriracha and keep at a gentle simmer for 2 minutes. Do not let it boil hard.

  6. Add the peeled and deveined shrimp and cook for 4 to 5 minutes, until opaque and the thickest part reaches 145°F (63°C).

  7. Remove the pot from the heat and stir in the lime juice.

  8. Ladle the soup into bowls and top with the chopped green onion and cilantro leaves. Serve hot.

By tastykitchen. Recipe from Open Recipes.

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. Ginger + coconuttop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together1,168 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  2. Carrot + gingertop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together1,377 recipes

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

  3. Olive + garlictop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together23,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  4. Garlic + chickentop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together10,839 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-ethyl-2,5-dimethylpyrazine (roasted, nutty).

  5. Olive + chickentop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together10,796 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid hexyl ester (sweet, green).

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

Flavor stand-ins for the carrot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (olive, garlic, ginger, chicken, fish sauce, shrimp, coconut):

  1. Tomatobetter flavor fit
  2. Capsicumbetter flavor fit
  3. Potatobetter flavor fit
  4. Carrotthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against olive, garlic, ginger, chicken, fish sauce, shrimp, coconut. 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).