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Celery Soup Puree, Spanish Style

A creamy celery soup made with butter, broth, cream, and egg yolks, finished with parsley and fried bread crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,810 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Celery Soup Puree, Spanish Style

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the celery

  1. Clean and wash the celery, trimming off the green parts.

  2. Cut the tender parts into 1-inch pieces and slice the celery roots finely.

  3. Parboil the celery and roots for 5 minutes, then immerse in cold water, drain, and dry.

Make the soup

  1. In a saucepan, melt the butter and add the celery and roots, seasoning with salt, pepper, nutmeg, and sugar.

  2. Cover and simmer until moisture is reduced.

  3. Add the white broth and a bunch of parsley.

  4. Garnish with leeks and green onions.

  5. Boil until the celery is well cooked.

  6. Add the thickened veal or chicken broth.

  7. Boil slowly for 20 minutes.

  8. Remove the parsley bundle.

  9. Strain the soup through a fine sieve.

Finish and serve

  1. Return the soup to the saucepan to keep warm.

  2. Mix in the cream, egg yolks, and butter off the heat until melted.

  3. Garnish with chopped parsley.

  4. Garnish with small fried bread crumbs before serving.

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. Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Nutmeg + parsleytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

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

  4. Celery + leektop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,093 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Leek + oniontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,326 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl butyrate (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Celery
Forms the body of the soup and gives its main flavour and texture once cooked and strained.
Celery roots
Add a deeper, earthy celery flavour and help thicken the soup as they cook down.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, velvety mouthfeel to the finished soup.
Egg yolks
Enrich and thicken the soup gently when stirred in off the heat, adding smoothness.
Butter
Adds fat for rich flavour and a silky mouthfeel to the soup.
Broth
Provides the liquid base and savoury depth of the soup.

The step that matters

Mix in the cream, egg yolks, and butter off the heat. Egg yolks thicken by gentle heat; if the soup is boiling when they are added, they can scramble and turn grainy. Removing the pan from the heat keeps the liquid smooth and silky.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Parsnipfits better
  3. Turnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against celery, butter, pepper, nutmeg, sugar, parsley, leek. 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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