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Cream of Summer Squash

A creamy soup made from summer squash, onion, herbs, butter, flour, milk, and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Henrietta Latham Dwight · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Cream of Summer Squash

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the squash

  1. Peel the squash, slice thin, put in a saucepan and add boiling water to come nearly to the top of the squash.

  2. When nearly tender add an onion, a bay leaf and several sprigs of parsley.

  3. When tender mash through a fine sieve.

Make the soup

  1. Return to the fire, let it come to a boil.

  2. Stir in a heaping tablespoonful of butter, a heaping teaspoonful of flour, season with salt and pepper and a tiny pinch of mace.

  3. Have almost as much boiling milk as puree.

  4. Remove from the fire and stir together.

  5. Add two tablespoonfuls of cream.

  6. Serve at once.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

60Calories
1 gProtein
6 gFat
3 gCarbs

Counts 5 of 6 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 5 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Cream1 tbsp (15ml) heavy51
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Bay Leaf1 leaf (0.6g)2
Parsley1 tbsp chopped fresh (3.8g)1
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Macenot 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 Henrietta Latham Dwight. 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.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Parsley + macetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,268 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Pepper + macetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,257 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  4. Cream + macetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,009 recipes
  5. Cream + peppertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together21,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Pepper and mace barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,257 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Squash (in the method)
Forms the main body of the soup and gives it its bulk and flavour.
Butter (in the method)
Adds richness and a smooth, rounded mouthfeel to the puree.
Flour (in the method)
Thickens the puree slightly so the soup holds a smooth, creamy body.
Cream
Adds fat and richness, giving a silkier texture and mellower finish.

The step that matters

Adding the boiling milk to the puree. Milk added to a hot thickened puree can curdle or separate if it is cold or the mixture boils hard, so the milk should be near boiling and stirred in gently while the pan is off the heat.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, parsley, pepper):

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Celeryfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, parsley, 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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