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Cracker Soup

A light soup thickened with cracker dust, seasoned with salt and pepper, and finished with butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Chicken and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 13,902 recipes. Both carry 2-furfurylthiol, which smells coffee, roasted. The science ↓

Cracker Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. In a pot, heat the chicken broth.

  2. Season with salt and pepper.

Thicken and serve

  1. Add the butter and stir until melted.

  2. Gradually add cracker dust to thicken the soup.

  3. Serve warm, especially for those who are unwell.

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).

  3. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken broth
Forms the liquid base that the soup is built on.
Cracker dust
Thickens the broth as its starch absorbs liquid and swells.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, giving the soup a smoother mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Gradually add cracker dust to thicken the soup. Cracker dust added all at once can clump and form lumps because the starch hydrates unevenly. Adding it slowly while stirring lets each addition disperse before the next, giving a smooth, evenly thickened soup.

“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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