Skip to main content
Soup

White Soup

A white soup of stock thickened with almonds and egg yolks, served over slices of French roll.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Almond and rice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,456 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

White Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Boil the crumb of a roll in the milk.

  2. In a mortar, beat the egg yolks with the almonds and cayenne pepper until well combined.

Make the soup

  1. Add the almond mixture to the stock and stir well.

  2. For a variation, wash and blanch the rice, then add it to the soup and let it stew until it swells.

  3. You can also thicken the soup with ground rice, sago, tapioca, or arrowroot.

  4. If using macaroni, soak it in cold water and add it to the soup until tender.

  5. Add vermicelli after thickening, as it requires less cooking time.

  6. If the stock is made with fowl, pound the white meat and add it to the soup for extra flavor.

Serve

  1. Serve the soup over slices of French roll.

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. Almond + ricetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,456 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Milk + ricetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

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

  3. Rice + parmesan cheesetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together879 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + ricetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,379 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Pepper + parmesan cheesetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,322 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Emulsify and thicken the soup, giving it a rich, smooth body.
Almonds
Add richness and a creamy, smooth texture when ground and blended in.
Milk
Softens the bread crumb and adds creaminess to the soup.
Stock
Forms the liquid base that carries the flavor of the whole soup.
French roll
Soaks up the soup, becoming a tender base for serving.

The step that matters

Beating the egg yolks with the almonds. Yolks must be fully blended into the almond paste before adding the stock, so they disperse evenly instead of clumping. Smooth incorporation gives the soup an even, creamy texture.

Swap the almond

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, egg, pepper, rice, parmesan cheese):

  1. Beansfits better
  2. Walnutfits better
  3. Peasfits better
  4. Almondthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, egg, pepper, rice, parmesan cheese. 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.

More white soup recipes

Stock 28Swiss 18Westerfield 14Veal 5Rich 4Plain 3 See all 83 →

You might also like

Indian Spiced Potato Soup with Tofu and SpinachIndian Spiced Potato Soup with Tofu and Spinach448 recipesClear Carrot and Bottle Gourd SoupClear Carrot and Bottle Gourd Soup65 recipesMock Bisque SoupMock Bisque Soup51 recipesCream of Asparagus SoupCream of Asparagus Soup42 recipes