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Vegetable Porridge

A thick vegetable porridge made with carrots, turnip, celery, tomatoes, parsley, rice, and herbs simmered in water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Vegetable Porridge

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. Pare the carrot, turnip, and tomatoes.

  2. Cut them into ¼‑inch dice.

  3. Cut the celery stalks in the same way.

  4. Chop the parsley finely.

  5. Pick over the rice and wash it in a colander under running water.

Simmer and serve

  1. Put all ingredients into a soup kettle with 4 quarts of cold water, salt, pepper, thyme, marjoram, bay leaves, and cloves.

  2. Bring the kettle to a boil over low heat, then simmer gently for about 2 hours until the vegetables are tender.

  3. Add boiling water to maintain 4 quarts, adjust seasoning to taste, 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.

  1. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

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

  3. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  4. Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Rice
Thickens the broth as its starch cooks, giving the porridge its body.
Carrot
Adds sweetness and color, and holds its shape as it softens during simmering.
Turnip
Adds mild sweetness and body as it softens during the long simmer.
Tomatoes
Adds acidity and moisture, helping build a rounded, savory flavor.
Celery stalks
Adds aromatic savory flavor and some texture to the broth.

The step that matters

Simmer gently until the vegetables are tender. A rolling boil breaks up the diced vegetables and cloudies the broth, while gentle simmering lets them soften evenly. Keeping the volume at 4 quarts with boiling water keeps the seasoning and starch concentration consistent.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (carrot, turnip, celery, parsley, rice, pepper, thyme):

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Okrafits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against carrot, turnip, celery, parsley, rice, pepper, thyme. 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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