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Chicken Cream Soup

A soup made from chicken, corned ham, onion, rice, milk, and butter, thickened with flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Chicken Cream Soup

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 ↓

Chicken Cream Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Combine the chicken, corned ham, onion, and cold water in a soup kettle.

  2. Bring to a gentle boil and simmer until the liquid reduces by one-third and the meat falls from the bones.

Finish the soup

  1. Add the rice and season with salt, pepper, and chopped parsley.

  2. Cook slowly until the rice is tender, then remove the chicken.

  3. Stir in the milk thickened with a little flour.

  4. Optionally, fry the reserved chicken meat in butter and make a gravy to add to the soup.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Chicken + ricetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,769 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

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

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

  4. Chicken + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  5. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 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

Old chicken
Gives the broth its main meaty flavor and body as it simmers down.
Corned ham
Adds salty, savory depth to the broth.
Rice
Thickens the soup slightly as its starch softens during cooking.
Milk
Makes the soup creamy and mellows its savory flavor.
Flour
Thickens the milk so it gives the soup a smooth, body-rich texture.
Butter
Adds richness and browning flavor when the optional chicken is fried.

The step that matters

Stirring the thickened milk into the soup. Flour mixed into milk can clump if added without being smoothed first, and milk can curdle or scorch if it boils hard. Keeping the soup at a gentle heat once the milk goes in helps it stay smooth and creamy.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, ham, onion, rice, pepper, milk, flour):

  1. Turmericfits better
  2. Garlicfits better
  3. Celeryfits about as well
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, ham, onion, rice, pepper, milk, flour. 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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