Skip to main content
Main

Macaroni Soup

A simple soup made with macaroni, butter, stock, and served with grated Parmesan.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Butter and parmesan cheese are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,163 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Macaroni Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the macaroni

  1. Bring 2 quarts of clear stock to a boil.

  2. Add 3 oz. of macaroni, 1 walnut-sized piece of butter, and a pinch of salt.

  3. Simmer for 1 hour until the macaroni is tender.

  4. Drain the macaroni.

  5. Cut the drained macaroni into thin rings or lengths.

  6. Add the macaroni to the boiling stock.

  7. Stew gently for 5 minutes.

Serve

  1. Serve with grated Parmesan cheese.

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. Butter + parmesan cheesetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,163 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Walnut + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Walnut + parmesan cheesetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together230 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3,5-trimethylpyrazine (cocoa, roasted).

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

What each ingredient does

Macaroni
Forms the body of the soup, softening as it cooks and adding starchy substance.
Butter
Adds fat that gives the soup richness and a rounder, smoother mouthfeel.
Clear stock
Serves as the savory liquid base that carries the flavor of the whole soup.

The step that matters

Stewing the macaroni in the stock. Macaroni starch keeps absorbing liquid and softening the longer it cooks. Extended boiling can make the pasta mushy and cloud the stock, so keep the simmer gentle and watch for tenderness.

Swap the walnut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, parmesan cheese):

  1. Peasfits about as well
  2. Walnutthe original
  3. Pecansfits about as well
  4. Lima beansfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, 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 macaroni soup recipes

Tomato 8Veal 5 See all 191 →

You might also like

Macaroni and CheeseMacaroni and Cheese102 recipesCheese MakingCheese Making50 recipesCheese FrittersCheese Fritters34 recipesCheese OmeletteCheese Omelette31 recipes