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Clam Soup

A creamy soup made with clams, milk, potatoes, butter, flour, parsley, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Clam Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the clams very fine and drain them in a colander.

  2. Chop the potatoes finely and boil them with the milk in a double boiler.

  3. Rub the flour and butter together until creamy.

Make the soup

  1. After the milk and potatoes have boiled for 15 minutes, stir in the flour and butter mixture and cook for 8 more minutes.

  2. Add the parsley, salt, pepper, and the heated, skimmed clam liquor, then cook for 3 more minutes.

  3. Finally, add the clams and serve.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

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

  4. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  5. Milk + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

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

What each ingredient does

Clams
Provide the main flavor and texture of the soup.
Milk
Forms the creamy liquid base of the soup.
Potatoes
Soften during cooking and thicken the soup body.
Flour
Thickens the milk when cooked with butter into a roux.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, and combines with flour to thicken.

The step that matters

Stirring in the flour and butter mixture. Lumps can form if the flour and butter are added to hot milk without being fully blended first. Cooking the mixture for a few minutes after adding it removes the raw flour taste and allows the soup to thicken evenly.

“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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