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Clear Soup

A vegetable soup made with onions, celery, carrot, turnip, herbs, nutmeg, butter, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By T. R. Allinson · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 15 ingredients
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Clear Soup

Why it works: Celery and carrot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Clear Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Chop the large Spanish onion finely.

  2. Fry the chopped onion in 1-1/2 oz butter in the saucepan until brown.

  3. Add 5 pints water to the saucepan.

  4. Prepare carrot, turnip, and celery into small pieces.

  5. Add the carrot, turnip, celery, 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg, mixed herbs, pepper, and salt to the water with the fried onions.

  6. When the vegetables are tender, drain the liquid.

  7. Return the liquid to the saucepan and boil the soup.

Add the second batch and simmer

  1. Chop 2 large English onions finely.

  2. Fry the onions in 1 oz butter in the saucepan until brown.

  3. Add 3 pints water to the saucepan.

  4. Cut carrot and turnip into thin slices.

  5. Add carrot, turnip slices, 1 teaspoon herbs, 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg, pepper, and salt to the soup.

  6. Let the soup boil for 1 hour.

  7. Drain the liquid.

  8. Return the liquid to the saucepan.

Make the egg garnish and serve

  1. Beat 4 eggs with 1/2 pint clear soup, a little nutmeg, pepper, and salt.

  2. Mix the beaten eggs with the soup and season with nutmeg, pepper, and salt.

  3. Pour the mixture into a buttered jug.

  4. Set the jug in a pan with boiling water and let the mixture thicken.

  5. Cut off little lumps with a spoon and throw them into the soup.

  6. Boil the soup until ready to serve.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

205Calories
10 gProtein
7 gFat
28 gCarbs

Counts 8 of 10 ingredients. The other 2 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 8 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Onion1 medium (110g)44
Turnip1 medium (122g)34
Carrot1 medium (61g)25
Nutmeg1 tsp ground (2.2g)12
Celery1 stalk (40g)6
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Waternot in our table0
Soupnot 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 T. R. Allinson. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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. Celery + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Celery + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Onion + turniptop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set and thicken the mixture into small lumps that give the soup body.
Onions
Fried until brown, they add deep savoury sweetness and colour to the broth.
Butter (in the method)
Fat used to fry the onions, carrying flavour and aiding browning.
Carrot and turnip
Simmered in the broth, they release sweetness and body into the soup.
Celery
Simmered in the broth, it adds aromatic flavour to the stock.

The step that matters

Setting the egg mixture in the jug. Eggs thicken when gently heated, and too much heat makes them curdle and turn grainy. Keep the water in the outer pan just at a simmer or below, so the mixture sets into soft lumps rather than scrambling.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (celery, nutmeg, carrot, turnip, egg, pepper):

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against celery, nutmeg, carrot, turnip, egg, pepper. 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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