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Clam Soup

A soup made from clams, water, butter, flour, egg yolks, cream, parsley, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Clam Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Boil the clams in 2 quarts of water.

  2. Mix in the butter and flour.

Finish and serve

  1. Just before removing from heat, stir in the egg yolks and cream.

  2. Add parsley and pepper, then let it simmer for a few minutes.

  3. Serve hot.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  3. Clam + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together840 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + parsleytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 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

Clams
Provide the main flavor and body of the soup.
Butter
Adds richness and carries flavor through the soup.
Flour
Thickens the soup as it cooks, giving it body.
Egg yolks
Enrich and thicken the soup when stirred in near the end.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, velvety texture.

The step that matters

Adding the egg yolks and cream. Egg yolks can curdle or scramble if they get too hot. Stirring them in just before removing the soup from heat, rather than boiling afterward, helps keep the soup smooth and thick.

Swap the parsley

The recipe marks parsley as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (clam, butter, flour, egg, cream, pepper):

  1. Nutmegfits about as well
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Tarragonfits less well
  4. Capersfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against clam, butter, flour, egg, cream, 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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