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Pea Soup

A hearty soup made with split peas, potatoes, onions, and pork or ham bone, seasoned with pepper, sea salt, and celery seed.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Pea Soup

Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Pea Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the split peas in cold water overnight.

Cook the soup

  1. Put the peas into a pot with water, potatoes, onions, and pork or ham bone or dried beef.

  2. Cover the pot tightly and boil slowly for 5 hours.

  3. Season with pepper and coarse sea salt to taste. Add celery seed for flavor.

Serve

  1. Serve the pork on a platter with the vegetables after the soup.

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

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

  2. Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  3. Potato + porktop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  4. Potato + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,047 recipes

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

  5. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Split peas
Break down during long simmering to thicken the soup and give it body.
Potatoes
Break down into the broth, adding starch that thickens and smooths the soup.
Pork or ham bone
Releases savory flavor and gelatin into the water during slow simmering.
Onions
Soften and sweeten as they cook, adding aroma and depth to the broth.

The step that matters

Cover the pot tightly and boil slowly for 5 hours. A gentle simmer lets the peas fully soften without scorching on the bottom. Keeping the lid on limits evaporation so the soup stays at the intended volume and thickness.

Swap the peas

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, onion, pork, pepper, celery):

  1. Beansfits better
  2. Sesamefits better
  3. Black-eyed peafits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, onion, pork, pepper, 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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