Skip to main content
Soup

Tomato Bisque

A creamy tomato bisque made with canned tomatoes, sweet milk, flour, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Tomato Bisque

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 Bisque

Ingredients

Directions

Make the tomato base

  1. Combine 1 can of tomatoes and ½ cup of water in a pot and cook for 15 minutes.

  2. Strain the mixture through a fine sieve into a porcelain or aluminum kettle.

Add the milk and finish

  1. Boil 1½ cups of sweet milk in another vessel.

  2. Mix 2 teaspoons of flour with a little sweet milk to create a smooth paste. Pour the flour mixture and boiling milk into the boiling tomatoes.

  3. Add pepper and coarse sea salt to taste, and boil for 5 minutes.

  4. Serve hot in bouillon cups or soup plates.

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. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Tomato + flourtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,065 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Milk and flour 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

Tomatoes
Provide the main body and acidic, sweet tomato flavor of the bisque.
Sweet milk
Adds richness and creamy body, softening the acidity of the tomatoes.
Flour
Thickens the soup as its starch gelatinizes in the hot liquid, giving a smooth texture.

The step that matters

Stirring the flour paste into the boiling tomatoes. Flour mixed with liquid first into a smooth paste, then added to hot liquid, disperses evenly. Lumps form if flour is dumped in dry or added to cool liquid, and the starch then thickens unevenly.

Swap the tomato

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, flour, 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.

More tomato bisque recipes

Soup 6 See all 83 →

You might also like

Indian Spiced Potato Soup with Tofu and SpinachIndian Spiced Potato Soup with Tofu and Spinach448 recipesClear Carrot and Bottle Gourd SoupClear Carrot and Bottle Gourd Soup65 recipesMock Bisque SoupMock Bisque Soup51 recipesCream of Asparagus SoupCream of Asparagus Soup42 recipes