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Beef Soup

A hearty soup made with beef, potatoes, onions, cabbage, tomatoes, and a flour‑butter roux.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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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 ↓

Beef Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Put beef in cold water.

  2. Boil until tender.

  3. Remove meat.

Cook the vegetables

  1. Add potatoes, onions, cabbage, and tomatoes.

  2. Cook until tender.

  3. Drain vegetables.

  4. Mash them finely.

Finish the soup

  1. Brown flour in butter.

  2. Add to the liquid.

  3. Bring to a boil.

  4. Season with salt and pepper.

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

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

  2. Potato + tomatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,798 recipes

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

  3. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

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

  4. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Browned in butter and stirred into the liquid, it thickens the soup.
Butter
Carries the browning of the flour, adding a nutty, toasted flavour.
Potatoes
Cook until tender and mash into the broth, adding body and starch to thicken it.
Tomatoes
Add acidity and sweetness, along with moisture, to the broth.

The step that matters

Brown flour in butter. Flour cooked in fat must be stirred constantly until it turns golden. Under-cooked flour tastes raw and pasty, while over-browned flour turns bitter and dark. Adding it to the hot liquid without lumps keeps the soup smooth.

Swap the cabbage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, potato, onion, tomato, flour, butter, pepper):

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Okrafits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, potato, onion, tomato, flour, 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.

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