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Pea Soup

A hearty soup of tomatoes, beans, peas, potatoes, onions, celery, salt pork, butter, milk, and flour, served with toasted bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Pea Soup

Why it works: Tomato and beans match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,713 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Pea Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. In a saucepan, boil the tomatoes until soft.

  2. In another pot, combine the white beans and split peas with water and cook until tender.

  3. In a frying pan, melt the butter and sauté the onions and celery until soft.

Make the soup

  1. Add the cooked beans and peas to the sautéed vegetables.

  2. Stir in the diced potatoes and enough water to cover the mixture. Simmer until the potatoes are tender.

  3. In a small bowl, mix the flour with a little water to create a paste, then add it to the soup to thicken.

  4. Pour in the milk and season with salt and pepper. Heat through without boiling.

  5. Toast the bread slices and serve them on the side.

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. Tomato + beanstop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,713 recipes

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

  2. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  3. Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

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

  4. Beans + potatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together655 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  5. Beans + peastop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together949 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

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

What each ingredient does

Split peas and white beans
Provide the body and starch that give the soup its thick, hearty texture.
Potatoes
Break down as they cook, adding body and thickening the soup.
Milk
Adds creaminess and a mild sweetness to the soup.
Flour
Thickens the soup when mixed into a paste and stirred in.
Butter
Adds richness and carries flavor from the sautéed onions and celery.

The step that matters

Heat through without boiling. Once milk is added, boiling can cause it to scorch on the pan and separate or curdle, spoiling the smooth texture of the soup.

Swap the peas

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

  1. Chickpeafits better
  2. Lima beansfits better
  3. Peanutfits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, beans, milk, potato, onion, celery, butter. 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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Green 380Split 228Baked Split 20Creamed 13Dried 10Winter 9 See all 368 →

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