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Split Pea Soup

A thickened soup made from split green peas, bacon, flour, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Split Pea Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the peas

  1. Boil the split green peas in 2 quarts of water.

  2. Strain the peas through a strainer and return them to the pot.

  3. Add 2-3 slices of bacon to the pot.

Thicken and season

  1. Mix 1 cup of flour with enough water to make a smooth paste.

  2. Thicken the soup with the flour paste.

  3. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

  4. If you prefer, substitute the bacon with 1 heaping tablespoon of butter.

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. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Peas + peppertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,331 recipes

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

  3. Peas + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,887 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Split green peas
Break down as they simmer, giving the soup its body and thickness.
Bacon
Adds smoky, savory fat that flavors the whole pot of soup.
Flour
Its starch swells in hot liquid and thickens the soup.

The step that matters

Thicken with the flour paste. Flour stirred in dry clumps into hot liquid, and its starch cannot disperse evenly. Mixing it into a smooth paste first, then stirring it in while the soup is hot, lets the starch swell evenly and thicken the soup without lumps.

Swap the peas

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

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Black-eyed peafits better
  3. Chestnutfits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, pepper, 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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