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Barley Cream Soup

A creamy soup made with veal, barley, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Barley Cream Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup

  1. Cut the veal into strips and place it in a pot with the water and barley.

  2. Cook slowly for 4 hours.

  3. Remove the meat and strain the liquid into a bowl.

  4. Rub the barley through a soup sieve.

Finish and serve

  1. Season the soup with salt, pepper, and parsley.

  2. Bring the soup to a boil.

  3. Serve the soup, which should have a creamy consistency.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Barley + parsleytop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together630 recipes

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

  3. Barley + peppertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together897 recipes

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

  4. Veal + parsleytop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,766 recipes

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

  5. Veal + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,049 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Barley
Its starch thickens the broth, and rubbing it through a sieve gives the soup a creamy body.
Veal
Slow cooking breaks down connective tissue and collagen, enriching the broth with body and flavour.

The step that matters

Rub the barley through a soup sieve. Pressing the cooked barley forces starch and soft grain into the liquid, which is what makes the soup creamy. Pressing too little leaves it thin and grainy.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, barley, pepper):

  1. Parsleythe original
  2. Celeryfits about as well
  3. Thymefits about as well
  4. Marjoramfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, barley, 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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