Name: Mexican Chicken Soup
Ingredients: 2 tablespoons canola oil; 2 medium onions, chopped; 2 stalks celery, chopped; 3 cloves garlic, minced; 1 tablespoon chili powder; 1 teaspoon ground cumin; 8 cups canned low sodium chicken broth; 4 ounces canned green chilies; 2 (15 1/2 ounce) cans posole, drained (mix yellow and white); 1 (15 ounce) can whole canned tomatoes, roughly chopped; 1 teaspoon dried oregano; 1 lb boneless skinless chicken thighs; 1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro leaves; 1 lime, juice of; kosher salt; fresh ground black pepper

Why it works: Onion and garlic match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 29,058 recipes. Both carry furaneol, which smells caramel, strawberry. The science ↓

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.

Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together29,058 recipes

Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).
Garlic + cumintop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,082 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Cumin + tomatotop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,272 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Garlic + tomatotop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together14,076 recipes

Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).
Clove + cumintop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,306 recipes

Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken thighs: Provide rich meat flavor and stay tender through long, gentle cooking.
Onions: Add sweetness and savory depth as they soften in the oil.
Canned tomatoes: Add acidity and body to the broth as they simmer.
Posole: Adds chewy, starchy kernels that thicken the soup slightly and add texture.
Green chilies: Add mild heat and a fresh, vegetal aroma to the broth.
Chicken broth: Forms the liquid base and carries the flavors of the other ingredients.

The step that matters

Adding the hominy 30 minutes before serving. Posole is already cooked, so adding it late keeps its kernels plump and chewy rather than soft and mushy after hours of simmering.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (canola oil, onion, celery, garlic, cumin, chicken, tomato):

Oreganofits better
Corianderfits better
Turmericfits better
Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against canola oil, onion, celery, garlic, cumin, chicken, tomato. 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.

Ingredient	Portion assumed	kcal
Chicken	100g cooked	165
Olive Oil	1 tbsp (14g)	119
Onion	1 medium (110g)	44
Tomato	1 medium (123g)	22
Lime	juice of 1 lime (44ml)	11
Chili	1 tsp (2.7g)	8
Cumin	1 tsp ground (2.1g)	8
Celery	1 stalk (40g)	6
Black Pepper	1 tsp ground (2.3g)	6
Oregano	1 tsp dried (1.8g)	5
Garlic	1 clove (3g)	4
Cilantro	1 tbsp chopped fresh (1g)	1
Salt	1 tsp (6g)	0

Mexican Chicken Soup