Name: Rabbit Soup
Ingredients: 2 quarts rabbit broth; 1 teacup rice; 1 cup milk; 1 onion; Salt to taste; Pepper to taste; 1 oz butter; Chopped parsley for garnish

Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Rabbit Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Peel and wash the onion, then chop it finely.
In a pot, combine the rabbit broth, chopped onion, salt, pepper, and butter.
Simmer until the onion is tender.

Cook and serve

Add the rice and cook for about 30 minutes longer.
Stir in the milk and bring to a boil.
Garnish with chopped parsley and serve.

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.

Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together34,122 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,374 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together25,843 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Rice + oniontop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together10,433 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Rabbit broth: Forms the liquid base that carries the flavour of the soup.
Rice: Thickens the soup as its starch softens during cooking.
Milk: Adds richness and a mild sweetness that softens the broth.
Onion: Adds savoury depth and aroma as it softens in the broth.
Butter: Adds fat for richness and a rounder mouthfeel.

Swap the onion

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

Potatofits better
Carrotfits better
Capsicumfits better
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rabbit, rice, milk, pepper, butter, parsley. 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.