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Lentil Potage

A simple lentil soup with onions, carrots, and bay leaf.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Lentils and carrot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 505 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Lentil Potage

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. Rinse the lentils under cold water.

Cook the soup

  1. In a pot, heat olive oil over medium heat and sauté the onion and carrots until soft.

  2. Add the lentils, water, salt, pepper, and bay leaf.

  3. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 30-40 minutes until lentils are tender.

  4. Remove the bay leaf before serving.

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. Lentils + carrottop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together505 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Lentils + olivetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together727 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Lentils + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,221 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Lentils
Provide the main body and thickening starch as they soften in the simmering liquid.
Olive oil
Carries the flavor of the aromatics and helps soften the onion and carrots.
Onion
Builds savory sweetness as it softens and browns slightly in the oil.
Carrots
Add gentle sweetness and soft texture to the soup.

The step that matters

Simmering until the lentils are tender. Lentils need steady simmering to soften fully. Cooking too hard can break them apart unevenly, while stopping early leaves them firm and grainy inside.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lentils, carrot, olive, pepper):

  1. Spinachfits better
  2. Parsnipfits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lentils, carrot, olive, pepper. 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.

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