Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
Cream of Corn Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the corn
Run the can of corn through a sieve or flour sifter.
Thicken and heat
Heat the corn, thickening it slightly with flour rubbed with butter.
Add the thickened corn to boiling milk in a double boiler.
Heat together for 20 to 30 minutes.
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.
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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Corn + milktop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,955 recipes
Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Corn + flourtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,165 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Corn + buttertop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,345 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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
- Corn
- Forms the main body and sweet corn flavour of the soup.
- Flour
- Its starch swells when heated, thickening the soup to a creamy consistency.
- Butter
- Coats the flour so it disperses smoothly and adds richness to the soup.
- Milk
- Forms the liquid base and gives the soup its creamy texture.
The step that matters
Thickening the corn with flour rubbed with butter. Flour starch clumps when it meets hot liquid unless its granules are separated first. Rubbing the flour with butter coats the granules so they disperse evenly, and the starch then swells smoothly as the soup heats, giving an even, lump-free thickness.
“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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