Why it works: Flour and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 106,462 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Souffle for Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the dough
Mix flour with a little boiling water and salt.
Remove from heat and add the eggs.
Roll the mixture thin and cut into strips, then into small pieces.
Roll the pieces in a sieve.
Fry and serve
Fry in hot lard.
Serve on top of the soup.
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.
-
Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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
- Flour
- Forms the dough structure that holds the pieces together while frying.
- Eggs
- Add structure and richness to the dough, helping it bind and set.
- Hot lard
- Fries the pieces quickly, giving them a crisp, browned exterior.
The step that matters
Fry in hot lard. The lard must be hot enough to puff and crisp the small pieces quickly. If it is too cool, the dough absorbs fat and turns greasy and heavy instead of light and crisp.
“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
Tomato Soup526 recipes
Brown Bread461 recipes
Mutton Broth292 recipes
Yorkshire Pudding264 recipesThe free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.