Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and 81,283 recipes mention both. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
Tomato Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Combine
Combine one quart water, one quart tomatoes, one quart milk, one tablespoon butter, one tablespoon cornstarch, a little parsley, three whole cloves, one sliced onion, one teaspoon sugar, one-half teaspoon soda, and pepper to suit taste.
Cook and strain
Boil water, tomatoes, onion, cloves, sugar, and parsley together for fifteen minutes.
Add soda and strain.
Finish
Thicken the milk with cornstarch, add butter and tomatoes, and do not boil.
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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together20,633 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Tomato + clovetop 12% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together3,474 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).
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Clove + oniontop 13% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together16,901 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).
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Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together42,912 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Tomatoes
- Provide the main body, moisture and tart flavor of the soup.
- Milk
- Adds creaminess and a mild, rich body to the soup.
- Cornstarch
- Thickens the milk so the soup becomes smooth and velvety when heated.
- Butter
- Adds fat for richer flavor and a smoother mouthfeel.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness that balances the acidity of the tomatoes.
- Soda
- Neutralizes some tomato acid, reducing the risk of the milk curdling.
The step that matters
Thicken the milk and do not boil. Cornstarch thickens the milk when it is heated gently. Boiling the milk and tomato mixture can make it curdle or separate, so it should be kept hot but never allowed to boil.
Flavor stand-ins for the clove
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, milk, butter, sugar, onion):
- Cinnamonbetter flavor fit
- Garlicbetter flavor fit
- Thymebetter flavor fit
- Clovethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, milk, butter, sugar, onion. 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).
“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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