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Tomato-cream Soup

A creamy tomato soup made with canned or ripe tomatoes, optional chicken broth, salt, pepper, baking soda, and whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,923 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Tomato-cream Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the tomatoes

  1. Boil the tomatoes slowly for 1 hour.

  2. Strain the mixture.

Season and finish

  1. Add chicken broth if convenient, salt, pepper, and baking soda.

  2. Boil for 5 minutes.

  3. Stir in the whipped cream and serve immediately.

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

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

  2. Tomato + chickentop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,031 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Chicken + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,958 recipes

    Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).

  4. Pepper + creamtop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together21,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

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

Pepper and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 21,449 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

Tomatoes
Provides the main body, moisture and tangy flavor of the soup.
Whipped cream
Adds fat for richness and a silky, smooth texture.
Baking soda
Neutralizes some of the tomatoes' acidity, mellowing their sharpness.

The step that matters

Stir in the whipped cream and serve immediately. Whipped cream is a foam that deflates and can separate when heated or held, so it should be added at the end, off the heat if possible, and served right away.

Swap the tomato

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, pepper, 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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