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Potato Soup

A hearty soup made with beef or mutton bone, potatoes, rice or barley, water, salt, pepper, and milk.

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

Why it works: Potato and rice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 851 recipes. Both carry 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline, which smells popcorn, roasted. The science ↓

Potato Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Break the beef or mutton bone into pieces and boil in water.

  2. Skim the surface as it cooks.

Finish the soup

  1. When nearly done, add the sliced potatoes and rice or barley.

  2. Season with salt and pepper, and boil gently for 30 minutes.

  3. Add a little milk and simmer for an additional 10 minutes.

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. Potato + ricetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together851 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  2. Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

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

  3. Beef + potatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,052 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Beef or mutton bone
Releases flavor and body into the water as it boils, forming the base of the broth.
Potatoes
Break down as they cook, thickening the soup and giving it a starchy, creamy body.
Rice or barley
Absorbs liquid and swells as it cooks, adding bulk and a soft, thick texture.
Milk
Adds richness and a mellow, creamy flavor to the finished soup.

The step that matters

Adding the milk. Milk can curdle or scorch if it boils hard, so it is added near the end and only simmered gently to keep it smooth.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Potatothe original
  2. Capsicumfits about as well
  3. Tomatofits about as well
  4. Carrotfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, rice, pepper, milk. 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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