Name: Cream of Lima Bean Soup
Ingredients: 1 cup dried lima beans; 3 pints cold water; 2 slices onion; 4 slices carrot; 1 cup cream or milk; 4 tablespoons butter; 2 tablespoons flour; 1 teaspoon salt; ½ teaspoon pepper

Why it works: Carrot and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,555 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Cream of Lima Bean Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beans

Soak beans overnight.
Drain the beans and add cold water; cook until soft, then rub through a sieve.

Make the soup

Cut the onions and carrots into small cubes, and cook for five minutes in half the butter.
Remove the vegetables, add flour, salt, and pepper, and stir into the boiling soup.
Add cream, reheat, strain, and add the remaining butter in small pieces.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

940Calories

31 gProtein

27 gFat

145 gCarbs

Counts 9 of 10 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 9 portions

Ingredient	Portion assumed	kcal
Flour	1 cup (125g) all-purpose	455
Milk	1 cup (244ml) whole	149
Lima Beans	1/2 cup (85g) cooked	108
Butter	1 tbsp (14g)	102
Cream	1 tbsp (15ml) heavy	51
Onion	1 medium (110g)	44
Carrot	1 medium (61g)	25
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.

By Fannie Merritt Farmer. 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.

Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together14,555 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together21,601 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,516 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together68,474 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Lima beans + carrottop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together131 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

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

What each ingredient does

Dried lima beans: Cooked soft and rubbed through a sieve, they form the body and thickness of the soup.
Butter: Enriches the soup with fat and flavour, added at the end for a smooth, rich finish.
Flour: Thickens the soup as it is stirred into the boiling liquid.
Cream or milk: Adds richness and a silky, creamy texture to the finished soup.

The step that matters

Stirring the flour into the boiling soup. Flour added to hot liquid can clump if not stirred in well. Stirring it in thoroughly before the cream is added gives a smooth, evenly thickened soup.

Swap the lima beans

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, carrot, cream, butter, flour, pepper):

Beansfits better
Cashew nutfits better
Chestnutfits better
Lima beansthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, carrot, cream, butter, flour, 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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Cream of Lima Bean Soup