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Spinach Soup

A soup made with spinach, onion, stale bread, and milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Spinach Soup

Why it works: Spinach and onion match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,336 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Spinach Soup

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Chop the spinach and onion together using a meat chopper, followed by the bread to minimize waste.

  2. Place the mixture into a double boiler with the milk.

  3. Cook until the spinach is tender.

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. Spinach + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,336 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  3. Spinach + breadtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  4. Onion + breadtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,676 recipes

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

  5. Onion + milktop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

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

What each ingredient does

Spinach
Forms the bulk of the soup and gives it its green color and soft texture when cooked.
Stale bread
Its starch and absorbency thicken the soup and add body.
Milk
Forms the liquid base and adds creaminess through its fat and milk proteins.
Onion
Adds a mild savory aroma that flavors the soup.

The step that matters

Cook until the spinach is tender. A double boiler keeps the milk at a gentle heat. Milk can scorch or stick to the pan if it overheats, and overcooked spinach loses its bright color and fresh flavor.

Swap the spinach

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, bread, milk):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Tomatofits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Spinachthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, bread, milk. 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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