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Leek Soup

A soup made from leeks, potatoes, water, milk, butter, pepper, and sea salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Leek Soup

Why it works: Leek and potato work together. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 30 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-ol, which smells mushroom, earthy. The science ↓

Leek Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Peel, wash, and chop the leek and potatoes.

  2. Cook them in the water until tender.

Make the soup

  1. Rub the vegetables through a sieve.

  2. Return the mixture to the saucepan.

  3. Add the milk, butter, and seasoning.

  4. Bring to a boil and 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.

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. Leek + potatotop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  4. Potato + milktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

  5. Leek + peppertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together965 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Starch that cooks down to thicken the soup and give it body.
Leek
Provides the main savoury, mild onion flavour of the soup.
Butter
Adds fat for a richer mouthfeel and rounder flavour.
Milk
Adds creaminess and softens the soup's flavour.

The step that matters

Rub the vegetables through a sieve. Pressing the cooked potato and leek breaks their starch-filled cells, so the purée becomes smooth and thickens. Skipping or rushing this leaves the soup gritty and thin.

Swap the leek

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Tomatofits better
  4. Leekthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, milk, butter, 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.

More leek soup recipes

Scotch 9Chicken 4Potato 4Welsh 3 See all 47 →

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