Name: Tomato Soup No. 3
Ingredients: 1 quart stewed tomatoes (canned or fresh); 2 quarts strong soup stock; Salt to taste; Pepper to taste; 1 teaspoon butter; Celery salt to taste

Why it works: Tomato and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and 3,377 recipes mention both. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Tomato Soup No. 3

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the tomatoes

Heat the stewed tomatoes and pass them through a fine colander or strainer to remove seeds.
In a pot, combine the strained tomatoes with the strong soup stock.

Season and serve

Season with salt and pepper to taste.
Add the butter and a little celery salt.
Heat through 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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairs

Aroma overlapmoderate

Mentioned together3,377 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs

Aroma overlapstrong

Mentioned together16,012 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs

Aroma overlapmoderate

Mentioned together17,923 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs

Aroma overlapmoderate

Mentioned together85,593 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Tomato + buttertop 22% of all pairs

Aroma overlapmoderate

Mentioned together6,918 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Stewed tomatoes: Provide the main body, acidity and tomato flavor of the soup.
Strong soup stock: Forms the savory liquid base and adds depth to the soup.
Butter: Adds fat for richer flavor and a smoother, rounder mouthfeel.

Flavor stand-ins for the celery

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

Thymebetter flavor fit
Parsleybetter flavor fit
Basilabout as good a flavor fit
Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, pepper, butter. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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.