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Gumbo Soup

A tomato and okra stew with chicken in ham gravy, finished with an egg yolk and vinegar mixture.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Gumbo Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Stew the tomatoes in a porcelain kettle.

  2. Add the okra, thyme, parsley, and onion to the tomatoes.

  3. Cook until tender.

Make the chicken and egg mixture

  1. Fricassee the chicken in ham gravy.

  2. Beat the egg yolks with vinegar and lemon juice.

  3. Season to taste.

  4. Pour the egg mixture over the chicken.

Combine and simmer

  1. Add everything to the tomatoes.

  2. Fill the kettle nearly with water.

  3. Boil for 4 to 5 hours.

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.

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. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Okra + parsleytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together206 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Tomato + okratop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together327 recipes

    Shared aroma: damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Okra + thymetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together145 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Okra + oniontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together715 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

Tomatoes
Form the stewed base that gives the gumbo its body and acidity.
Okra
Releases mucilage as it cooks, thickening the broth and giving it a silky texture.
Egg yolks
Enrich and thicken the mixture, adding richness and body when combined with the chicken.
Chicken
Provides the main meat, cooked gently in ham gravy for savory flavor and tender texture.

The step that matters

Pour the egg mixture over the chicken. Egg yolks thicken when heated but can curdle if they get too hot too quickly. Adding them to the warm chicken and gravy gently, rather than boiling them, keeps the mixture smooth.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, okra, thyme, parsley, chicken, ham, egg):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, okra, thyme, parsley, chicken, ham, egg. 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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