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Potato Soup

A creamy soup made from boiled potatoes, onion, garlic, parsley, milk, butter, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Potato Soup

Why it works: Onion and garlic match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 29,058 recipes. Both carry furaneol, which smells caramel, strawberry. The science ↓

Potato Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup base

  1. Boil the potatoes, onion, garlic, and parsley in enough water to cover them until well cooked.

  2. Press the mixture through a potato press.

Finish the soup

  1. Heat the milk in a double boiler and add the potato mixture.

  2. Stir in the butter, coarse sea salt, celery salt, and black pepper to taste.

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. Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together29,058 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  2. Parsley + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

  3. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  4. Potato + garlictop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,517 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  5. Garlic + parsleytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,308 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Break down into starch that thickens the soup and gives it a smooth body.
Milk
Adds creaminess and a soft, rich body to the pureed potato base.
Butter
Adds fat for a silkier mouthfeel and a rounded, rich flavor.
Onion
Contributes savory sweetness and aroma as it softens during boiling.

The step that matters

Heating the milk gently in a double boiler. Milk scorches and can curdle or form a skin if overheated. A double boiler keeps the heat gentle and even, so the milk warms smoothly without sticking to the pan.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, onion, garlic, parsley, milk, butter, celery):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Dillfits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, onion, garlic, parsley, milk, butter, celery. 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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