Skip to main content
Main

Cream of Carrot Soup

A soup made from carrots, onion, rice, milk, butter, and seasonings, finished with parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Carrot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,053 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Cream of Carrot Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Cook the chopped carrots in 2 cups of water until tender.

  2. Press the cooked carrots through a sieve, reserving the cooking water.

Make the soup

  1. In a double boiler, cook the rice in the scalded milk.

  2. Cook the onion in butter or drippings.

  3. Add flour and seasonings.

  4. Combine the carrot puree with the rice and milk.

  5. Add the reserved cooking water and bring to a boil.

  6. Strain the soup.

Serve

  1. Serve, garnished with chopped parsley.

  2. If the soup is too thick, thin it with additional milk.

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. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

  4. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

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

Carrots
Provide the main body, colour and natural sweetness of the soup.
Rice
Releases starch as it cooks, thickening the soup and giving it a fuller texture.
Milk
Adds creaminess and moisture, softening the flavour of the vegetables.
Butter or drippings
Adds fat that carries flavour and gives a rich mouthfeel.
Flour
Thickens the liquid when mixed with fat and heated, giving body to the soup.
Onion
Adds savoury aroma and depth as it softens in the fat.

The step that matters

Add the flour evenly before the liquids. Flour clumps easily and tastes raw if not fully blended with the fat. Mixing it smoothly lets its starch thicken the soup evenly as it heats, without lumps.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against carrot, pepper, parsley, rice, milk, butter, flour. 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.

You might also like

Carrot SoupCarrot Soup134 recipesRice FrittersRice Fritters84 recipesSteamed RiceSteamed Rice48 recipesRice Griddle CakesRice Griddle Cakes28 recipes