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Lexington Soup

A hearty soup made with veal, mutton, vegetables, rice, split peas, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,555 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Lexington Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Mince the meat and vegetables and crack the bones.

  2. Soak the split peas overnight in soft water and wash the rice.

Make the soup

  1. Combine all ingredients in a soup kettle and add the water.

  2. Stew gently, covered, for five hours, adding more water if it evaporates.

  3. Strain the soup, rubbing the vegetables through a colander.

  4. Return the soup to the fire, season, and boil slowly for ten minutes, skimming carefully.

Serve

  1. Place sliced lemon (with the yellow rind removed) in a tureen and pour the soup over it.

  2. Serve a slice of lemon in each bowl.

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. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

  2. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

  3. Carrot + ricetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,477 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Carrot + peastop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,994 recipes

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

  5. Onion + ricetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,433 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

Veal
Gives the soup its body and rich meaty flavour as it stews for hours.
Mutton with bones
Adds deeper meat flavour, and the bones release gelatin that gives body to the broth.
Split peas
Break down during long stewing and, once rubbed through a colander, thicken the soup.
Rice
Softens during stewing and adds starch, helping to thicken the soup.

The step that matters

Skimming while the soup boils. Fat and fine impurities rise to the surface as the soup simmers; skimming carefully keeps the broth clear and prevents a greasy, cloudy result.

Swap the peas

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, mutton, onion, carrot, rice, pepper):

  1. Beansfits better
  2. Peasthe original
  3. Sesamefits about as well
  4. Lentilsfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, mutton, onion, carrot, rice, 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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