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Chicken Soup

A chicken soup with breadcrumbs, butter, milk, flour, and egg balls.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Chicken Soup

Why it works: Butter and milk 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 ↓

Chicken Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Combine the chopped chicken or veal with the breadcrumbs in a pot.

  2. Stir in the butter until melted.

  3. Heat the milk until scalding in a separate saucepan.

  4. Mix the flour with the butter. Gradually add the hot milk to this mixture, stirring constantly.

Finish the soup

  1. Pour the mixture over beaten raw eggs, stirring quickly to avoid scrambling.

  2. Add the egg mixture to the chicken and breadcrumbs in the pot.

  3. Drop in the egg-balls and simmer until cooked through.

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 + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Chicken or veal
Provides the meaty body and savoury flavour of the soup.
Dry seasoned breadcrumbs
Adds body and absorbs liquid, giving the soup a thicker texture.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, carrying flavour through the soup.
Milk
Adds creaminess and softness to the broth base.
Flour
Thickens the milk mixture so it holds together smoothly.
Raw egg yolk
Sets gently when heated, adding richness and body to the egg-balls.

The step that matters

Pour the mixture over beaten eggs, stirring quickly. Eggs begin to set and scramble when they meet hot liquid too fast. Stirring constantly while pouring spreads the heat so the eggs thicken smoothly instead of forming curds.

“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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