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Vegetable Soup

A hearty soup made with beef or soup bone, cabbage, tomatoes, onions, potatoes, corn, egg, milk, flour, and served with crackers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Vegetable Soup

Why it works: Onion and potato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Vegetable Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Boil the soup bone or piece of beef until done.

  2. Add boiling water to the broth to reach the desired amount of soup.

Cook the soup

  1. Once boiling, add the chopped cabbage, tomatoes, onions, and potatoes.

  2. If using dried corn, add it after soaking; otherwise, add green corn.

  3. Boil for 30 to 45 minutes.

  4. For thickening, stir the egg or yolk with milk and flour, then add it 5 to 10 minutes before serving.

  5. Serve with crackers.

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. Onion + potatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Potato + corntop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together938 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Tomato + potatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,798 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Tomato + corntop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,099 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Soup bone or beef
Gives the broth its meaty flavor and body as it simmers.
Potatoes
Soften during simmering and add starch that gives the soup body.
Egg or egg yolk
Thickens the soup slightly when stirred in with milk and flour.
Flour
Helps thicken the liquid when mixed with the egg and milk.
Tomatoes
Add acidity and savory depth to the broth.

The step that matters

Adding the egg mixture. Egg added to hot liquid can curdle or scramble if it is not tempered first. Stirring the egg with milk and flour before adding it, and adding it near the end without a hard boil, helps it thicken the soup smoothly.

Swap the cabbage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, tomato, onion, potato, corn, egg, milk):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, tomato, onion, potato, corn, egg, milk. 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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