Why it works: Butter and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 85,593 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓
Clam Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the clams and liquor
Put clams into a pot of boiling water to make them open easily.
Take clams from shells, carefully saving the liquor.
Add three quarts of water to the liquor of fifty opened clams.
Make the soup base
Mix the water with the clam liquor and put it into a large pot with a knuckle of veal, the bone of which should be chopped in four places.
Simmer slowly for three hours.
Add a large bunch of sweet herbs, a beaten nutmeg, a teaspoonful of mace, and a tablespoonful of whole pepper, but no salt.
Stew slowly for an hour longer.
Strain the soup.
Return the liquor to the pot.
Add a quarter of a pound of butter divided into four and each bit rolled in flour.
Put in the clams, having cut them in pieces, and let it boil fifteen minutes.
Make the force-meat balls
Make small force-meat balls of cold minced veal or chicken mixed with equal quantities of chopped suet and sweet marjoram, and a smaller proportion of hard-boiled egg, grated lemon peel, and powdered nutmeg.
Pound all ingredients together in a mortar, adding a little pepper and salt.
Break in a raw egg or two to bind the mixture.
Form the mixture into small balls.
Boil the balls in the soup for ten minutes, shortly before serving.
Serve
Serve with toasted bread cut into dice.
Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)
Counts 3 of 4 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.
What these numbers assume: 3 portions
| Ingredient | Portion assumed | kcal |
|---|---|---|
| Butter | 1 tbsp (14g) | 102 |
| Black Pepper | 1 tsp ground (2.3g) | 6 |
| Salt | 1 tsp (6g) | 0 |
| Water | not in our table | 0 |
One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.
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.
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Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together85,593 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Clams (in the method)
- Provide the main flavour and the shellfish body of the soup.
- Butter
- Adds richness and body, thickened slightly by the flour coating each piece.
- Veal knuckle (in the method)
- Releases gelatin and savoury depth into the stock during long simmering.
- Egg (in the method)
- Binds the force-meat mixture so the balls hold their shape while cooking.
The step that matters
Boil the force-meat balls shortly before serving. Raw egg in the balls sets as it cooks, so overcooking makes them tough and rubbery, while adding them too early can leave them dense and fragile.
“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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