Why it works: Celery and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,012 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓
Dried Bean Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the beans
Wash beans and soak overnight in cold water.
Drain beans and place them in a soup pot with 3 quarts of cold water. Bring to a boil, then discard the water.
Add 4 quarts of boiling water to the beans and simmer for 4 hours. Add celery during the last hour of cooking.
Make the onion base
In a separate pan, cook onion and drippings slowly for 30 minutes.
Drain beans, saving the cooking water, and add them to the onion mixture.
Stir in flour and cook for another 30 minutes, stirring often.
Finish the soup
Mash mixture and gradually add reserved bean water until soup is thick and creamy.
Pass through a puree sieve and return to the heat.
Add salt and pepper, and cook for an additional 20 minutes.
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.
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Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together16,012 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
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Beans + celerytop 6% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together1,159 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol (clove, smoky).
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Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together18,518 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Beans + oniontop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together5,242 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Beans + peppertop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,733 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
- Dried beans
- Form the body of the soup and, once mashed, give it its thick texture.
- Onion and drippings
- Slow cooking builds a sweet, savory base that adds depth of flavor.
- Flour
- Thickens the soup as it cooks with the fats and the bean liquid.
- Celery
- Adds a fresh, aromatic flavor to the soup.
The step that matters
Stir in flour and cook for 30 minutes. Flour must be stirred often and cooked long enough to lose its raw taste and thicken evenly; otherwise it can clump or leave a pasty flavor in the soup.
Swap the onion
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beans, butter, flour, celery, pepper):
- Carrotfits better
- Okrafits better
- Leekfits better
- Onionthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against beans, butter, flour, celery, pepper. 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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