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Soup

Mock Oyster Soup

A tomato-based soup with baking soda, milk, butter, and soda crackers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Mock Oyster Soup

Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Mock Oyster Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Stew the tomatoes until well cooked.

  2. In a pot, combine the stewed tomatoes and boiling water.

  3. Add the baking soda and let it foam.

Finish and serve

  1. Once foaming stops, stir in the boiling milk.

  2. Add the butter, salt, and pepper, mixing well.

  3. Serve over soda crackers according to your taste.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  3. Tomato + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  4. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 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

Tomatoes
Provide the main body, acidity and flavor of the soup.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic tomatoes, producing foam and neutralizing some of the acidity.
Milk
Adds creaminess and mild sweetness, softening the tomato's sharpness.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, rounded mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Add the baking soda and let it foam. Baking soda reacts with the tomatoes' acid, releasing carbon dioxide and foaming. Adding it too fast or before the foaming settles can cause overflow, and the soup should be allowed to finish reacting before the milk goes in so the milk does not curdle or lose its texture.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, egg, butter, 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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