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Cream of Sorrel Soup

A soup made from minced sorrel simmered in stock, strained, and served with frothy milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Sorrel and milk work together. They rank in the top 26% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 140 recipes. Both carry 2-methylbutyraldehyde, which smells malty, chocolate. The science ↓

Cream of Sorrel Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and cook

  1. Wash the sorrel leaves and stems thoroughly and cut them with a silver knife.

  2. Cook the minced sorrel in the stock for 15 minutes.

Strain and simmer

  1. Rub the mixture through a fine colander back into the stock.

  2. Return the soup to the heat and cook for an additional 15 minutes.

Finish

  1. Add a pinch of baking soda to the milk before serving to create a frothy appearance.

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. Sorrel + milktop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together140 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

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

What each ingredient does

Sorrel
Gives the soup its characteristic tart, bright, lemony flavour and green colour.
Stock
Forms the liquid base that cooks the sorrel and carries its flavour through the soup.
Milk
Adds richness and softens the sharpness of the sorrel for a creamier texture.

The step that matters

Keep the second simmer gentle and brief. Sorrel is a delicate leafy green. Prolonged heat breaks down its bright colour and fresh, sharp flavour, leaving the soup dull olive and muted, so the extra 15 minutes should stay low and watched.

“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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