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Soup

Corn Soup

A soup made with grated corn, sweet milk, butter, mashed potatoes, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Corn and potato match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 938 recipes. Both carry (e)-2-octenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Corn Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup

  1. In a large pot, combine the grated corn, salt, pepper, sweet milk, butter, and mashed potatoes.

  2. Bring the mixture to a boil and cook for 5 minutes.

Serve

  1. Serve with toast cut into dice.

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. Corn + potatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together938 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

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

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

  3. Pepper + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Corn + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

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

What each ingredient does

Grated corn
Supplies the main flavour, natural sweetness and body of the soup.
Sweet milk
Forms the liquid base and gives the soup a creamy, rich texture.
Cold boiled potatoes
Their starch thickens the milk as it heats, giving the soup more body.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Bringing the mixture to a boil. Milk contains sugars and proteins that can scorch on the base of the pot and then boil over quickly. Keeping the heat moderate and stirring helps prevent sticking and spills.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Capsicumfits about as well
  2. Potatothe original
  3. Asparagusfits less well
  4. Sweet potatofits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against corn, pepper, milk, egg, 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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