Skip to main content
Main

Tomato Soup

A tomato soup made with milk, stewed tomatoes, butter, baking soda, salt, pepper, and crushed crackers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Tomato Soup

Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Tomato Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Heat the milk in a double boiler.

  2. Strain the stewed tomatoes.

  3. Boil the strained tomatoes in a separate dish.

Finish and serve

  1. Once boiling, add a pinch of baking soda, butter, salt, and pepper.

  2. Combine the tomato mixture with the hot milk and stir in the crushed crackers.

  3. Serve immediately.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Milk + tomatotop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  4. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

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

  5. Tomato + buttertop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,918 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Milk
Forms the creamy body of the soup and carries the other flavors.
Stewed tomatoes
Provide the main tomato flavor and acidity, with liquid for the soup.
Baking soda
Neutralizes some of the tomato's acidity, which keeps the milk from curdling as easily.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth mouthfeel to the soup.
Crushed crackers
Thicken the soup as they absorb liquid and soften.

The step that matters

Combine the tomato mixture with the hot milk. Acidic tomatoes can curdle milk when they meet it. Keeping the milk hot, adding the tomato mixture while it is near boiling, and pairing it with baking soda helps keep the soup smooth rather than separated.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Tomatothe original
  4. Asparagusfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, butter, 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.

More tomato soup recipes

Cream 27Clear 14Creamed 10Creamy 8French 8with Rice 8 See all 632 →

You might also like

Tomato BisqueTomato Bisque61 recipesTomato FrittersTomato Fritters23 recipesTomato PureeTomato Puree23 recipesMacaroni with Tomato SauceMacaroni with Tomato Sauce16 recipes