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Meatless Tomato Soup

A tomato soup made with tomatoes, boiling milk, baking soda, pepper, sea salt, and rolled crackers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,923 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Meatless Tomato Soup

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Soak the tomatoes in a little water until soft.

  2. Add 1 teaspoon of baking soda and let it effervesce.

  3. Strain the tomatoes and add 1 quart of boiling milk.

  4. Bring to a boil for a few minutes.

  5. Season with pepper and coarse sea salt, then add rolled cracker.

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

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

  2. Tomato + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Provide the main body and tomato flavor of the soup.
Milk
Adds creaminess and mellows the tomato acidity into a smooth soup.
Baking soda
Neutralizes tomato acidity, which can cause the milk to curdle and makes the soup smoother.
Rolled cracker
Thickens the soup slightly as it absorbs liquid.

The step that matters

Add the baking soda before the milk. Baking soda reacts with the tomato acid and produces foaming gas. Adding it after the milk risks curdling, and the reaction needs time to finish before the milk goes in.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Tomatothe original
  4. Carrotfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against 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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