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Soup Puree of Leeks, Viennoise

A creamy leek puree soup made with butter, broth, cream, egg yolks, and herbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Leek and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and 759 recipes mention both. Both carry trans-2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

The recipe

Ingredients

Contains: egg, milk, wheat (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Make the leek base

  1. Melt butter in a saucepan.

  2. Lightly fry sliced leeks without browning them.

  3. Add 1 to 2 quarts of broth.

  4. Cook until leeks are well cooked.

  5. Stir in 3 quarts of thickened chicken or veal broth.

  6. Season with salt, pepper, nutmeg, and a pinch of sugar.

  7. Add the parsley.

  8. Cook slowly for 25 minutes.

  9. Remove the parsley.

  10. Skim off any grease.

Strain and finish

  1. Pass soup through a fine sieve.

  2. Return to saucepan to keep warm.

  3. In a bowl, mix cream with egg yolks and 2 tablespoons butter until smooth.

  4. Stir mixture into soup until butter melted.

  5. Add chopped chives.

  6. Serve soup with fried bread crumbs 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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Leek + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together759 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together34,118 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Nutmeg + parsleytop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together5,062 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Butter + creamtop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together41,494 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Leeks
Provide the main flavour and body of the soup once cooked down and puréed.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, silky mouthfeel to the soup.
Egg yolks
Enrich and thicken the soup when stirred in gently, adding smoothness and body.
Butter
Adds fat for flavour and a glossy, rich finish to the soup.
Broth
Forms the liquid base that carries the flavour of the soup.

The step that matters

Stir the egg yolk and cream mixture into the soup. Egg yolks can curdle if the soup is too hot when they are added. Keep the soup warm, not boiling, and stir steadily so the yolks thicken it smoothly.

Flavor stand-ins for the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (leek, butter, chicken, pepper, nutmeg, sugar, cream):

  1. Cinnamonbetter flavor fit
  2. Thymeabout as good a flavor fit
  3. Celeryabout as good a flavor fit
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against leek, butter, chicken, pepper, nutmeg, sugar, cream. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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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