Skip to main content
Main

Mullagatawny Soup

A curry-flavored soup with veal, chicken, apples, and rice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Chicken and rice are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,769 recipes. Both carry (e,e)-2,4-decadienal, which smells fatty, deep fried. The science ↓

Mullagatawny Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the stock

  1. Combine chicken, veal, curry powder, cloves, sugar, peppercorns, and water in a large pot.

  2. Bring to a boil and simmer until the meat is tender.

  3. Strain the stock, reserving small pieces of meat.

Finish the soup

  1. Reheat the soup, adding more seasoning if desired, along with the rice and reserved meat.

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. Chicken + ricetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,769 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

  2. Clove + appletop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,774 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Clove + lemontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,150 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Lemon + ricetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,366 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

  5. Clove + ricetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,982 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Gives the stock its meaty body and rich flavor as it simmers.
Veal knuckle
Adds gelatin from the bones, giving the stock more body and mouthfeel.
Curry powder
Supplies the spiced aroma that defines the soup.
Sour apples
Add tartness that balances the spices and richness of the stock.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the soup and sharpens its flavors.
Cooked rice
Adds body and makes the soup more filling as it heats through.

The step that matters

Simmering until the meat is tender. Simmering gently keeps the stock clear and lets collagen in the chicken and veal break down into gelatin. A hard boil makes the broth cloudy and can toughen the meat.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, veal, clove, sugar, lemon, rice):

  1. Orangefits better
  2. Coconutfits better
  3. Limefits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, veal, clove, sugar, lemon, rice. 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.

You might also like

Chicken BrothChicken Broth257 recipesLemon SauceLemon Sauce236 recipesChicken SoupChicken Soup156 recipesCreamed ChickenCreamed Chicken89 recipes