Skip to main content
Soup

Celery Cream Soup

A creamy soup made with rice, milk, celery, stock, salt, cayenne pepper, and optional cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Celery Cream Soup

Why it works: Celery and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,012 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Celery Cream Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Boil the rice in the milk until it can pass through a sieve.

  2. Grate the white part of the celery.

  3. Add the grated celery to the strained rice milk.

Finish the soup

  1. Stir in the strong white stock and bring to a boil.

  2. Cook until the celery is tender.

  3. Season with salt and cayenne pepper, and serve.

  4. If using, substitute 1 pint of cream for 1 pint of milk.

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. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Rice + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Rice + peppertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,379 recipes

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

  5. Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Rice
Breaks down during boiling and thickens the soup, giving it body.
Milk
Forms the creamy base liquid and adds mild sweetness and richness.
Celery
Provides the main vegetable flavor and becomes soft and tender in the soup.
Strong white stock
Adds savory depth to the soup base.
Cream
Adds richness and a smoother, silkier mouthfeel when used instead of milk.

The step that matters

Boil the rice in the milk until it can pass through a sieve. Rice thickens the soup only when it is cooked long enough to break down. Undercooked grains stay firm and would leave the soup gritty or thin after straining.

Swap the celery

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

  1. Nutmegfits about as well
  2. Cinnamonfits about as well
  3. Celerythe original
  4. Cardamomfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, milk, 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.

You might also like

Cream of CeleryCream of Celery37 recipesIndian Spiced Potato Soup with Tofu and SpinachIndian Spiced Potato Soup with Tofu and Spinach448 recipesClear Carrot and Bottle Gourd SoupClear Carrot and Bottle Gourd Soup65 recipesMock Bisque SoupMock Bisque Soup51 recipes