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Cream of Spinach

A hot spinach soup thickened with butter, cornstarch, and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Cream of Spinach

Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Cream of Spinach

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the spinach

  1. Wash and pick the spinach, then boil it until soft and tender.

  2. Press the spinach through a sieve to make about 1 pint of pulp.

Make the soup

  1. In a pot, combine the spinach pulp with the chicken stock and heat until very hot.

  2. In a bowl, rub together the butter and cornstarch until smooth.

  3. Stir the butter and cornstarch mixture into the soup and continue stirring until very smooth.

  4. Season with salt and white pepper, then return to the pot.

  5. Add the cream and beat continuously with an egg whisk until light.

Serve

  1. Serve immediately while very hot.

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. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Chicken + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,902 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  3. Chicken + creamtop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,241 recipes

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

  4. Cream + white peppertop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,439 recipes
  5. Butter + white peppertop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Spinach (in the method)
Provides the green color and vegetable flavor that form the body of the soup.
Cornstarch
Thickens the stock into a smooth, velvety soup when heated.
Butter
Adds richness and smooth mouthfeel, and helps blend the cornstarch without lumps.
Cream
Adds richness and a silky texture to the finished soup.
Chicken stock
Forms the liquid base that carries the spinach flavor.

The step that matters

Stirring the butter and cornstarch into the hot soup. Cornstarch clumps if it hits hot liquid unblended. Working it in as a smooth paste and stirring constantly lets the starch disperse and thicken evenly into a smooth soup.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, butter, cream):

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, butter, 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.

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