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Pea Flour Soup

A soup made with pea flour, mint, water, milk, pepper, and sea salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Mint and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,372 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Pea Flour Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mint broth

  1. Boil the mint in the boiling water for 30 minutes.

  2. Strain the mixture.

  3. Rub it through a sieve.

Thicken and finish

  1. Mix the pea flour with a little of the milk.

  2. Add the remaining milk.

  3. Stir the mixture into the strained liquid.

  4. Season with pepper and salt.

  5. Cook until the soup thickens, about 5 to 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.

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. Mint + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,372 recipes

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

  2. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Milk + peppertop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together26,984 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  5. Mint + milktop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together458 recipes

    Shared aroma: phellandrene (minty).

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

Pea flour
Thickens the soup as its starch swells in the hot liquid, giving it body.
Milk
Adds richness and creaminess, softening the soup's flavour and texture.
Mint
Contributes the main aroma and fresh flavour to the broth.

The step that matters

Stirring the pea flour into the liquid. Pea flour clumps easily if added dry or too quickly. Mixing it first with a little cold milk to form a smooth paste lets the starch disperse evenly, so it thickens the soup without lumps.

Swap the mint

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

  1. Cardamomfits better
  2. Cinnamonfits better
  3. Turmericfits better
  4. Mintthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, milk, 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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