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Soup

Cream Potato Soup

A creamy soup made with onions, celery, milk, mashed potatoes, butter, flour, salt, pepper, cayenne, and parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Cream Potato Soup

Why it works: Onion and potato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Cream Potato Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup base

  1. In a double boiler, cook the chopped onion and celery with the milk.

  2. Mash the boiled potatoes very fine and pour the boiling milk over them.

  3. Strain the mixture and return it to the double boiler.

Thicken and season

  1. Melt the butter and stir in the flour, then add to the soup.

  2. Boil for five minutes.

  3. Add salt, white pepper, cayenne, and parsley just before serving.

  4. If the soup is too thick, add a little hot 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. Onion + potatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Celery + potatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,047 recipes

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

  4. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  5. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Break down into starch that gives the soup its creamy body.
Milk
Forms the liquid base and adds richness and a mild sweetness.
Butter
Adds fat for a smooth mouthfeel and rich flavour.
Flour
Thickens the soup as it heats, giving it body and preventing it from being watery.
Onion
Adds savoury aromatic flavour that builds the soup's base.

The step that matters

Boil for five minutes after adding the flour. Flour starch must reach a boil to swell and thicken fully; without it the soup can taste raw and stay thin or pasty.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, celery, milk, potato, butter, flour, pepper):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Turmericfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, celery, milk, potato, butter, flour, 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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