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Potato Soup

A creamy soup made from boiled and mashed potatoes, butter, onion in milk, and parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Potato Soup

Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Potato Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup

  1. Season the mashed potatoes to taste.

  2. Stir the scalded onion milk into the potatoes.

  3. Press the mixture smoothly through a sieve.

  4. Add just over 1 quart of milk and boil for 1 minute.

Serve

  1. Place chopped parsley in a tureen, pour the soup over it, and 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.

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 + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  2. Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

  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

Potatoes
Form the body of the soup, giving it thickness and a smooth, starchy texture.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, giving the soup a silky mouthfeel and rounder flavor.
Onion
Infuses the milk with savory aroma that carries through the whole soup.
Milk
Provides the liquid base, adding creaminess and helping loosen the potato purée.

The step that matters

Press the mixture smoothly through a sieve. Pressing cooked potato breaks down its cell structure, producing a smooth purée. Skipping this step or rushing it leaves lumps and a grainy texture in the finished soup.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Thymefits about as well
  3. Parsleythe original
  4. Cinnamonfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, butter, onion, 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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