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Clam Soup

A creamy clam soup made with clams, milk, butter, flour, and herbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Clam Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the clams

  1. Remove the hard parts from the clams.

  2. Place the soft halves on ice.

  3. Strain the clam liquor.

Make the broth

  1. Combine the clam liquor with the hard bits in a pot with 1 quart of hot water, onion, herbs, and mace.

  2. Simmer for 40 minutes.

  3. In another pot, heat the milk with a pinch of baking soda.

  4. Stir in the butter and flour mixture.

  5. Keep the mixture warm in hot water until the soup is ready.

  6. After 40 minutes, strain the clam broth and discard the hard parts.

Finish and serve

  1. Add the soft clams to the broth.

  2. Season with salt and cayenne.

  3. Bring to a gentle boil.

  4. Pour the soup into a tureen.

  5. Add the milk and butter mixture.

  6. Let it sit in hot water for 5 minutes before serving.

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. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Onion + thymetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,171 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

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

  5. Clam + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together840 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

What each ingredient does

Clams
Supply the main flavor and the soft meat that finishes the soup.
Milk
Gives the soup a creamy body and a mild, rounded sweetness.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, carrying flavor and smoothing the texture.
Flour
Thickens the soup when cooked with butter, giving it body.

The step that matters

Bring to a gentle boil. Milk proteins can curdle or scorch when heated hard or boiled, so keep the heat gentle once the milk and butter mixture is combined and the soup is brought up to temperature.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (clam, butter, flour, onion, thyme, parsley, milk):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Garlicfits better
  3. Fennelfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against clam, butter, flour, onion, thyme, parsley, milk. 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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