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Tomato Soup

A tomato soup thickened with flour and butter, served with fried bread and optional onion garnish.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Mansfield, W. H., & co., Putnam, Conn., pub. [from old catalog] · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 19 ingredients
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Tomato Soup

Why it works: Beef and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Tomato Soup

ten persons

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup base

  1. Combine one quart of soup stock, one quart of stewed tomatoes, four dessert spoons of sugar, salt to taste, a little grated nutmeg, four large tablespoonfuls of flour, and three large tablespoonfuls of butter; stir until thickened.

  2. Strain the mixture over cubes of fried bread or browned bread, and add a little pepper.

Make the beef broth

  1. Cut six pounds of beef and bone, add two quarts of cold water, and simmer slowly until all the strength is exhausted from the meat, about four hours.

  2. Strain the broth through a fine sieve, remove all fat, reduce to ten cupfuls by boiling, and season with salt and pepper only.

Serve

  1. Serve the soup in bouillon cups at luncheon and evening companies.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

940Calories
42 gProtein
29 gFat
125 gCarbs

Counts 9 of 11 ingredients. The other 2 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 9 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Beef100g cooked250
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Onion1 medium (110g)44
Tomato1 medium (123g)22
Nutmeg1 tsp ground (2.2g)12
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Soupnot in our table0
Waternot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Mansfield, W. H., & co., Putnam, Conn., pub. [from old catalog]. 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. See the original page.

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.

  1. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  2. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Tomato + beeftop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,448 recipes

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

  4. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

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

  5. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Stewed tomatoes
Provide the main body, acidity and flavour of the soup.
Flour
Thickens the mixture so it becomes smooth and body-rich when stirred.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that carries flavour and smooths the texture.
Beef
Releases its flavour and gelatin into the water during long, slow simmering.
Bread
Soaks up the strained soup, giving soft pieces with toasted flavour.

The step that matters

Simmer the beef slowly. Gentle simmering draws flavour and gelatin out of the meat gradually; a hard boil makes the broth cloudy and greasy.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, butter, flour, bread, sugar, onion, nutmeg):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, butter, flour, bread, sugar, onion, nutmeg. 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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