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Soup

How We Cook in Tennessee

A collection of Tennessee gumbo, stew and soup recipes made with chicken, squirrel, okra, tomatoes and rice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Jackson (Tenn.). First Baptist Church. The Silver Thimble Society · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 46 ingredients
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Why it works: Pork and beef match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,690 recipes. Both carry 12-methyltridecanal, which smells tallowy, beefy. The science ↓

How We Cook in Tennessee

Ingredients

Directions

Start the stew

  1. Boil three hours or longer.

  2. Start the soup bone to boil in a gallon of water.

  3. Crumb two or three biscuits into this water.

  4. Put vegetables in a pan and cook until soup water has been reduced by boiling to about one-half gallon.

  5. Then put in the vegetables and cook until thoroughly done, stirring often.

  6. Just before taking up the soup, put in one-half cup of sweet milk, stirring in well.

  7. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Brown and simmer the chicken

  1. Cut the chicken in small pieces and roll in flour and brown it well in butter.

  2. Put it into a soup kettle with the ham, onion and three pints of water and let cook slowly for one-half hour.

  3. Then add okra, tomatoes and rice.

  4. Boil one and one-half hours.

  5. Season to taste and serve.

Make the crab and chicken gumbo

  1. Take one dozen large crabs, one cup of butter, and two or three onions.

  2. Wash the crabs, taking care to get them free from sand.

  3. Take off the feelers and gills and divide the crabs into quarters.

  4. Brown the onions in the butter with two tablespoonfuls of flour.

  5. Put in the crabs with about a handful of chopped ham.

  6. Fill up the pot with three quarts of cold water.

  7. Just before serving, sift in about two tablespoonfuls of file.

  8. Do not let it boil after the file is put in.

  9. Serve with rice.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

2332Calories
164 gProtein
70 gFat
256 gCarbs

Counts 19 of 23 ingredients. The other 4 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 19 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Beef100g cooked250
Pork100g cooked242
Rice1 cup cooked (158g) white206
Biscuit1 medium (45g)166
Chicken100g cooked165
Potato1 medium (173g) baked161
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Ham100g cooked145
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Crab100g cooked97
Corn1/2 cup kernels (82g)77
Onion1 medium (110g)44
Okra1 cup (100g)33
Tomato1 medium (123g)22
Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Cayenne1 tsp (1.8g)6
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Macaroninot in our table0
Waternot in our table0
Squirrelnot in our table0
Stewnot 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 Jackson (Tenn.). First Baptist Church. The Silver Thimble Society. 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.

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. Pork + beeftop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,690 recipes

    Shared aroma: 12-methyltridecanal (tallowy, beefy).

  2. Okra + tomatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together327 recipes

    Shared aroma: damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Corn + ricetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together933 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Okra + ricetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together250 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol (clove, smoky).

  5. Tomato + corntop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,099 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Browned in fat, it thickens the stew and adds a nutty, toasted flavor.
Butter
Browns the flour and onions and adds richness and a rounded flavor.
Okra
Releases natural starch as it cooks, helping thicken the stew.
File
Ground sassafras leaves that thicken the gumbo and add a distinctive aroma.
Tomatoes
Add acidity and body, balancing the richness of the fat and meat.
Ham
Adds savory, smoky depth to the broth.

The step that matters

Do not let it boil after the file is put in.. Filé powder thickens the gumbo, but prolonged boiling can make it stringy and ropy and dull its flavor, so it is added just before serving.

Swap the okra

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, butter, tomato, corn, milk, beef, rice):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Okrathe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, butter, tomato, corn, milk, beef, rice. 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.

More gumbo recipes

Chicken 45Soup 37Okra 30Oyster 21Crab 8French 8 See all 76 →

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