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Mock Bisque Soup

A tomato-based bisque made with milk, butter, and cornstarch, served hot.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Mock Bisque 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 ↓

Mock Bisque Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the tomatoes

  1. Stew the tomatoes until soft enough to strain.

  2. If the tomatoes are very acidic, add ¼ teaspoon of baking soda before straining.

Make the base

  1. Boil the milk in a double boiler.

  2. In a small saucepan, cook the butter and cornstarch together, adding enough hot milk to make it pour easily.

  3. Stir this mixture into the boiling milk and boil for ten minutes.

  4. Add the remaining butter in small pieces and stir until well mixed.

Finish and serve

  1. Add salt, pepper, and the strained tomatoes.

  2. Serve very hot.

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. Tomato + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  3. Tomato + buttertop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,918 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  4. White pepper + buttertop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Tomato + white peppertop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together226 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl butyrate (fruity, apple).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Provide the main flavor and body of the bisque once stewed and strained.
Milk
Forms the creamy liquid base that gives the bisque its smooth, rich texture.
Cornstarch
Thickens the milk mixture so the bisque becomes smooth and creamy rather than watery.
Butter
Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel to the finished bisque.

The step that matters

Cooking the butter and cornstarch mixture with hot milk. Cornstarch must be cooked and stirred with liquid so the starch granules swell and thicken; adding it dry or to cold liquid causes lumps. Thinning with hot milk first helps it blend smoothly before it joins the boiling milk.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, milk, butter):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Celeryfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, milk, butter. 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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