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White Soup

A clear veal and ham soup with rice, almonds, milk, and eggs, simmered for hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Rice and almond match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,456 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

White Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the stock

  1. Crack the veal bones and cut the meat into small pieces.

  2. Place the veal, chopped ham, sliced onions, herbs, and mace in a soup pot.

  3. Pour in the cold water and boil slowly for five hours, reducing to three quarts.

  4. Strain the liquid.

  5. Season three pints of the strained liquid.

  6. Return the bones and solids to the pot.

  7. Cover tightly and store for tomorrow's stock.

Make the soup

  1. Add the soaked rice and a pint of water to the remaining liquid.

  2. Cook gently, ensuring it does not burn.

  3. Blanch the almonds by scalding off their skins and pounding them.

  4. When the rice is soft, stir in the pounded almonds.

  5. Cook slowly for ten minutes.

  6. Scald the milk.

  7. Gradually pour the scalded milk over the beaten eggs.

  8. Add the egg mixture to the soup.

  9. Stir for one minute without boiling.

  10. Pour into a tureen.

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. Rice + almondtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,456 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Milk + ricetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Onion + almondtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,769 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Veal + hamtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,264 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

Knuckle of veal
Releases gelatin and flavour into the water, giving the stock body.
Eggs
Thicken the soup gently when stirred in, adding richness and body.
Milk
Adds creaminess and softness, mellowing the stock's flavour.
Raw rice
Swells as it cooks, thickening the soup and adding body.
Blanched almonds
Pounded into the soup, they add nutty flavour and body.

The step that matters

Stir the egg mixture in without boiling. Egg proteins set and curdle when overheated, so the soup turns grainy instead of smooth and thick. Keep the heat low and stir for the full minute.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, ham, onion, milk, egg, rice, almond):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cinnamonfits better
  3. Turmericfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, ham, onion, milk, egg, rice, almond. 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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