Skip to main content
Main

Okra Soup

A hearty soup made with okra, onions, tomatoes, beans, corn, meat, and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Okra and lima beans share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 64 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Okra Soup

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Slice the okra pods and boil them in 1.5 gallons of water for 5 hours.

  2. Add the sliced onions and red pepper, then simmer for 2 hours.

  3. Stir in the tomatoes, lima beans, cymbelines, and corn.

  4. After 1 hour, add the fresh meat or chicken and bacon slices.

  5. Just before serving, stir in the cream and butter.

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. Okra + lima beanstop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together64 recipes

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

  2. Okra + tomatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together327 recipes

    Shared aroma: damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Lima beans + corntop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together222 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Tomato + corntop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,099 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Okra pods
Long simmering breaks down the pods, thickening the soup and giving it body.
Fresh meat or chicken
Adds savory flavor and protein-rich body to the broth.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, silky texture when stirred in at the end.
Tomatoes
Contribute acidity and liquid, building the soup's base flavor.

The step that matters

Just before serving, stir in the cream and butter.. Cream and butter are added off the heat or at the end so they do not curdle or separate from prolonged boiling, keeping the soup smooth and rich.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (okra, pepper, tomato, lima beans, corn, meat, cream):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against okra, pepper, tomato, lima beans, corn, meat, cream. 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.

More okra soup recipes

Beef 7 See all 84 →

You might also like

Meatless Tomato SoupMeatless Tomato Soup23 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesCorn FrittersCorn Fritters203 recipesCream of Tomato SoupCream of Tomato Soup107 recipes