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Cream of Barley Soup

A creamy soup made with pearl barley, onion, stock, cream, and egg yolks.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Cream of Barley Soup

Why it works: Barley and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,166 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Cream of Barley Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the barley

  1. Cook the barley and onion in 1 quart of boiling water for 45 minutes.

  2. Add the soup stock and cook until the barley is tender.

  3. Season with salt and pepper.

Finish the soup

  1. Gradually stir the hot cream into the beaten egg yolks.

  2. Pour the soup over the cream mixture.

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.

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. Barley + oniontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Barley + peppertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together897 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Onion + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together10,827 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  5. Pepper + creamtop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together21,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Onion and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 10,827 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

Pearl barley
Softens as it cooks, thickening the soup and giving it body and chew.
Egg yolks
Enriched with hot cream, they thicken the soup and give it a smooth, rich texture.
Hot cream
Adds fat and richness, softening the flavor and making the finished soup silky.

The step that matters

Gradually stir the hot cream into the beaten egg yolks. Adding hot liquid to egg yolks too quickly can scramble them. Tempering, adding the hot cream slowly while stirring, gradually raises the yolks' temperature so they thicken the soup smoothly instead of curdling.

Swap the onion

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against barley, pepper, cream, 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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