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Cream of Fish Soup

A creamy soup made with minced fish, onion, milk, and bread crumbs, thickened with butter, flour, and egg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Cream of Fish Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Remove bones, fat, and skin from the fish and mince it finely.

  2. Season the minced fish with salt.

Make the soup

  1. Boil the sliced onion in 2 cups of water, then set aside.

  2. Heat 1 cup of milk with a pinch of baking soda in another saucepan.

  3. Stir in 1 tablespoon of butter rubbed smooth with 1 teaspoon of flour into the boiling milk.

  4. Add the soaked bread crumbs and mix well.

  5. Beat in the whipped raw egg, then pour the boiling fish and onion water into the mixture while stirring continuously.

  6. Mix thoroughly and serve immediately.

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.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Fish + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  4. Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  5. Fish + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,488 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

What each ingredient does

Cold cooked fish
Forms the main body of the soup and gives it its flavour.
Milk
Provides the creamy base and soft, smooth texture of the soup.
Bread crumbs
Soaked in milk, they thicken the mixture and give it body.
Raw egg
Adds richness and helps bind and thicken the soup when stirred in.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, smoothing the thickening mixture with flour.
All-purpose flour
Mixed with butter to help thicken the milk and give a smooth consistency.

The step that matters

Beat in the whipped raw egg, then pour the boiling fish and onion water into the mixture while stirring continuously.. Egg proteins set when heated, so adding the egg and boiling liquid while stirring constantly keeps the mixture smooth rather than curdled or lumpy.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, milk, butter, flour, bread, egg):

  1. Asparagusfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, milk, butter, flour, bread, egg. 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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