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Split-pea Oe Bean Soup

A hearty soup made from split peas or beans, simmered with optional ham bone and onion, thickened with a butter and flour roux.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 68,474 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Split-pea Oe Bean Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the split peas or beans overnight in 3 quarts of cold water.

  2. In a saucepan, combine the soaked peas or beans with 2 quarts of water and the ham bone, if using.

  3. Optionally boil an onion with the peas or beans for added flavor.

Cook and strain

  1. Simmer for 4 to 5 hours.

  2. Add more water as needed until the peas or beans are soft.

  3. Pass the mixture through a sieve.

  4. Add enough stock, milk, or water to achieve a creamy consistency.

  5. Return the mixture to the saucepan.

Finish and serve

  1. Season with salt and pepper.

  2. Add a roux made from 1 tablespoon butter and 1 tablespoon flour cooked together.

  3. Dilute the roux with a little soup.

  4. Add the diluted roux to the pot.

  5. Serve with croutons on top or on the side.

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. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Peas + oniontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,460 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Butter and flour 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 peas or dried beans
Form the main body of the soup, breaking down into a thick, starchy base as they cook.
Butter and flour roux
Thickens the soup into a smoother, richer consistency as it is stirred in.
Ham bone
Adds savory, meaty flavor to the cooking liquid as it simmers.

The step that matters

Adding the diluted roux. Roux must be cooked, then thinned with hot soup before being added, so it blends smoothly without lumps. Adding it cold or undiluted can clump and thicken unevenly.

Swap the onion

The recipe marks onion as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (peas, butter, sugar, flour, pepper, ham):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against peas, butter, sugar, flour, pepper, ham. 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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