Why it works: Milk and butter 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 ↓
Oyster Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the oysters
Wash the oysters in 1 quart of cold water if they are solid, or in 1 pint if they are liquid.
Drain the water through a colander into a kettle and bring to a boil, skimming carefully.
Make the soup
In a separate pot, bring 1 quart of milk to a boil.
Thicken the boiling milk with 2 tablespoons of corn starch mixed with a little cold milk.
Add the boiling oyster liquor, ½ cup of butter, and the oysters to the thickened milk.
Season with salt and pepper to taste and serve.
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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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Milk + corntop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,955 recipes
Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).
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Corn + peppertop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,324 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Oyster + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,184 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).
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Corn + buttertop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,345 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Oysters
- Provide the main flavor and tender bite of the soup.
- Milk
- Forms the creamy body of the soup.
- Corn starch
- Thickens the hot milk so the soup becomes smooth and creamy.
- Butter
- Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel to the soup.
The step that matters
Thicken the boiling milk with corn starch. Corn starch must be mixed with cold milk first so it disperses without clumping, then it thickens as the hot milk reaches a simmer. Adding it dry or to cold liquid causes lumps.
“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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