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Tomato Bisque

A creamy tomato soup thickened with corn starch, seasoned with salt, pepper, and baking soda, served with toasted crackers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Tomato Bisque

Why it works: Tomato and corn match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,099 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Tomato Bisque

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup

  1. In a pot, combine 2 quarts of soup stock and 1 quart of ripe tomatoes. Boil for 10 minutes.

  2. Strain the mixture through a fine strainer back into the pot.

  3. Add 1 quart of cream or rich milk and bring to a boil.

Thicken and finish

  1. Mix 1 tablespoon of corn starch with a little milk until smooth, then stir it into the soup until creamy.

  2. Just before serving, add ½ teaspoon of baking soda and season with salt and pepper.

Serve

  1. Serve with large crackers that have been split and browned in the oven.

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. Tomato + corntop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,099 recipes

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

  2. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  3. Corn + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,324 recipes

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

  4. Cream + peppertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together21,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Cream + corntop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,532 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

Cream and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 21,449 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Ripe tomatoes
Provide the main flavor and body of the soup base.
Cream or rich milk
Adds richness and a smooth, velvety texture through its fat.
Corn starch
Thickens the soup so it becomes creamy and holds together.
Baking soda
Neutralizes some of the tomato acidity, mellowing the flavor and softening the color.

The step that matters

Adding the baking soda. Baking soda reacts with tomato acid and releases gas, causing foaming and possibly curdling the cream if added too early or in excess. Adding it just before serving keeps the soup smooth.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, corn, 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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