Name: Tomato Soup
Ingredients: ¾ can of tomatoes; 4 cups of water; ¼ teaspoon pepper; ¼ teaspoon salt; ¼ can of tomatoes; 1 teaspoon flour

Why it works: Tomato and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,923 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Tomato Soup

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup

Combine ¾ can of tomatoes and 4 cups of water in a pot.
Add a pinch of pepper and salt.
Boil slowly for 15 minutes.

Make the sauce

For the sauce, stew the remaining ¼ can of tomatoes with 1 teaspoon of flour and a pinch of pepper and salt for 5 minutes.

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.

Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together17,923 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together50,459 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Tomato + flourtop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,065 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes: Provide the main flavor, acidity and body of the soup.
Flour: Thickens the sauce as its starch swells in the simmering tomato liquid.