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Tomato Bisque

A creamy tomato soup made with tomatoes, butter, milk, baking soda, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Tomato Bisque

Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Tomato Bisque

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Simmer the strained tomatoes for 10 minutes.

  2. Add butter, salt, and pepper to the tomatoes.

  3. Scald the milk in a separate pot.

  4. Stir baking soda and sugar into the tomatoes.

  5. Combine the thickened milk with the tomato mixture, but do not allow it to boil.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  3. Tomato + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  4. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Tomatoes
Form the base of the soup and provide its acidity and body.
Milk
Adds creaminess and a smooth, rich texture to the soup.
Butter
Adds fat for richer flavor and a silkier mouthfeel.
Baking soda
Neutralizes some of the tomato acidity, mellowing the flavor and helping prevent curdling.
Sugar
Balances the tomato's acidity with a touch of sweetness.

The step that matters

Do not let the soup boil after adding the milk. Milk proteins can curdle or separate when heated with acidic tomatoes, so the mixture should be kept hot but below a boil to stay smooth.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Sweet potatofits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, milk, sugar, 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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