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Celery Soup

A creamy soup made from celery, stock, butter, flour, milk, and egg yolks.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Celery Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup

  1. Simmer the celery in stock for 1 hour until very soft.

  2. Strain the mixture.

  3. Bring the strained mixture back to a boil.

Make the roux

  1. Melt the butter in a small saucepan until bubbling.

  2. Stir in the flour to make a roux.

  3. Gradually add 1 cup of the soup to the roux.

  4. Stir vigorously until smooth.

  5. Once the roux boils and thickens, stir it into the soup.

Finish and serve

  1. Beat the egg yolks until light.

  2. Fill the cup with rich milk.

  3. Add the milk and egg yolks to the boiling soup.

  4. Let it come to a boil.

  5. Serve.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Celery + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,905 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Celery
Provides the main flavor and, when simmered until very soft, body for the soup.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, and forms the base of the roux with the flour.
Flour
Thickens the soup when cooked in butter to form a roux.
Rich milk
Adds creaminess and softens the soup's flavor.
Egg yolks
Enrich and thicken the soup, giving it a smooth, velvety texture.

The step that matters

Adding the milk and egg yolks to the boiling soup. Egg yolks thicken by setting when heated, but they can curdle if the soup is too hot or boils after they are added. Bring the soup to a boil first, then add the mixture and heat gently so the yolks thicken smoothly.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, milk, egg):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Cinnamonfits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, milk, egg. 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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