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Green Pea Soup

A soup made from shelled peas, milk, onion, and optional cream or celery.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Green Pea Soup

Why it works: Onion and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,518 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Green Pea Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the peas

  1. Gently simmer the shelled peas in enough water to cook them, leaving almost no juice when tender.

  2. Rub the peas through a colander, moistening with a little cold milk if necessary.

Make the soup

  1. Add the sifted peas, rich milk, and halved onion to a pot.

  2. Boil together for 5 to 10 minutes until the soup is delicately flavored.

  3. Remove the onion with a skimmer, add salt to taste, and serve.

  4. If desired, stir in thin cream just before serving.

  5. Celery can replace the onion or both can be omitted.

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Peas + celerytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  3. Peas + oniontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,460 recipes

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

  4. Peas + milktop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,309 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  5. Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Shelled peas
Provide the main body and sweet, vegetable flavor of the soup once pureed.
Rich milk
Adds richness and a smooth, creamy body to the soup.
Onion
Infuses the soup with a mild aromatic flavor and is removed before serving.
Thin cream
Adds fat for a silkier mouthfeel and softer flavor when stirred in at the end.

The step that matters

Rubbing the peas through a colander. Pushing cooked peas through a colander breaks cell walls and separates the pulp from the skins, giving a smooth texture. Adding a little cold milk keeps the purée loose enough to pass through.

Swap the onion

The recipe marks onion as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (peas, milk, cream, celery):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Carrotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against peas, milk, cream, celery. 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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