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Mushroom Soup

A creamy soup made with fresh mushrooms, chicken stock, butter, flour, cream, salt, and white pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Mushroom Soup

Why it works: Mushroom and chicken are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,172 recipes. Both carry 1-butyl acetate, which smells fruity, banana. The science ↓

Mushroom Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mushrooms

  1. Remove the stock from the mushrooms and mash them.

  2. Chop the mushrooms finely with a silver knife.

Make the soup

  1. In a pot, heat the chicken stock over medium heat and simmer for 30 minutes.

  2. Add the salt and simmer for an additional 10 minutes.

  3. In a saucepan, melt the butter and add the flour; cook for 1 minute.

  4. Gradually add the cream to the mushrooms, then mix it into the butter and flour, stirring to maintain a smooth thickness.

  5. Heat until the mixture reaches a boiling point, then add a dash of white pepper.

  6. Serve in cups for luncheon.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Mushroom + chickentop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,172 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-butyl acetate (fruity, banana).

  2. Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Mushroom + creamtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,500 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

Mushrooms
Provide the main earthy flavor and body of the soup.
Butter and flour
Form a roux that thickens the soup into a smooth texture.
Cream
Adds richness and a smoother, creamier mouthfeel.
Chicken stock
Forms the liquid base that carries the mushroom flavor.

The step that matters

Mixing the cream into the butter and flour. Adding cold cream to a hot roux or mushrooms too quickly can cause lumps; stirring steadily while adding it keeps the thickening smooth.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mushroom, chicken, butter, flour, cream):

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mushroom, chicken, butter, flour, cream. 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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