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Tomato Soup

A soup made with stock, tomatoes, sugar, salt, pepper, flour, and optional cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Tomato Soup

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 ↓

Tomato Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup

  1. Add the tomatoes, sugar, salt, and pepper to the stock.

  2. Cook for one hour.

Thicken and finish

  1. Mix the flour with cold water to make a thick paste.

  2. Add the thick paste to the soup.

  3. Cook for an additional ten minutes.

  4. Strain the soup through a fine sieve.

  5. Just before serving, stir in the cream if desired.

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.

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.

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

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

  2. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + creamtop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Stock
Forms the liquid base that carries the soup's flavour.
Tomatoes
Provide the main body, colour, and acidity of the soup.
Sugar
Balances the acidity of the tomatoes with a touch of sweetness.
Flour
Thickens the soup as its starch swells and sets when heated.
Cream
Adds richness and a smoother texture to the finished soup.

The step that matters

Adding the flour paste. Flour added dry or unmixed clumps and stays raw-tasting. Mixing it into cold water first makes a smooth paste, and the extra ten minutes of simmering lets the starch swell fully and thicken the soup evenly.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Arrowrootfits better
  2. Spinachfits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, pepper, flour, cream. 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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