Why it works: Egg and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 106,462 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Noodle Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Make the dough
Mix the eggs with enough flour to make a very stiff dough.
Add the baking powder to the flour before mixing.
Roll the dough thin and let it dry for 1 hour.
Cut the dried dough into very fine strips.
Cook the soup
Boil the strips in the beef stock for 20 minutes.
Season to taste.
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.
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Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + beeftop 25% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together10,677 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Egg + beeftop 31% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,305 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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
- Eggs
- Bind the flour into a stiff dough and add structure once cooked.
- All-purpose flour
- Forms the gluten network that gives the noodles their body and chew.
- Baking powder
- Releases gas that lightens the dough and gives the noodles a tender texture.
- Beef stock
- Cooks the noodles while flavouring the broth they sit in.
The step that matters
Drying the rolled dough. Dough that is too moist can stick together or cook gummy, while letting it dry properly firms it so the cut strips keep their shape and texture in the hot stock.
“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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