Skip to main content
Main

Cream of Asparagus Soup

A creamy soup made with asparagus, ham bone, onion, mace, and milk, thickened with a roux.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Cream of Asparagus 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 ↓

Cream of Asparagus Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the stock

  1. Bring the soup stock to a boil in a pot with the knuckle bone, onion, mace, and white pepper.

  2. Boil the asparagus pieces in the stock for about an hour.

  3. Remove the asparagus tips and set them aside.

Make the soup

  1. Melt the butter in a separate pan and stir in the flour to make a roux.

  2. Gradually add the rich milk to the roux, stirring until smooth and thickened.

  3. Combine the thickened mixture with the soup stock and add the sugar, adjusting seasoning with salt and pepper.

  4. Serve the soup hot, garnished with the reserved asparagus tips.

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. Asparagus + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,212 recipes

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

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Asparagus + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together936 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Asparagus
Provides the main vegetable flavour and body of the soup as it simmers in the stock.
Butter
Fat that combines with flour to form the roux, adding richness and body.
Flour
Thickens the soup by forming a roux with butter before the milk is added.
Rich milk
Forms the creamy base of the soup and, with the roux, gives it a smooth, thick texture.
Soup stock
Forms the liquid base of the soup and carries the flavour of the other ingredients.

The step that matters

Adding the milk to the roux. Adding the milk gradually while stirring keeps the roux smooth and prevents lumps, so the sauce thickens evenly before it is combined with the stock.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (asparagus, ham, sugar, onion, milk, butter, flour):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against asparagus, ham, sugar, onion, 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

Asparagus SoupAsparagus Soup179 recipesAsparagus SaladAsparagus Salad77 recipesCream of AsparagusCream of Asparagus38 recipesBoiled AsparagusBoiled Asparagus27 recipes