Name: Vegetable Soup
Ingredients: 2 turnips; 1 onion; 2 carrots; 2 potatoes; 2 parsnips; water to cover; 2 cups milk (optional)

Why it works: Turnip and parsnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 590 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Vegetable Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Cut the potatoes into ¼ inch dice and slice the other vegetables.

Cook and strain

Boil all the vegetables together in water for three hours or more.
Strain the mixture; you should have about 4 cups of liquid.

Finish

If desired, add 2 cups of milk to the vegetable water.

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.

Turnip + parsniptop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together590 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Carrot + parsniptop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,097 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
Turnip + carrottop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together8,002 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Onion + potatotop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together9,023 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Carrot + potatotop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together3,107 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes: Their starch thickens the broth and gives the soup body as they break down.
Carrots: Add natural sweetness and a bit of colour to the broth.
Parsnips: Contribute sweetness and a earthy, aromatic flavour to the broth.
Onion: Adds savoury aroma and depth to the broth.
Turnips: Add mild, slightly peppery flavour and some body to the broth.
Milk: Adds creaminess, richness and softer flavour to the soup.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (turnip, carrot, potato, parsnip, milk):

Leekfits better
Beetrootfits better
Lettucefits better
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against turnip, carrot, potato, parsnip, milk. 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.