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Clam Soup with Poached Egg

A clam soup thickened with butter and flour, finished with poached egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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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 ↓

Clam Soup with Poached Egg

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the clams

  1. Clean the clams and pick over them.

  2. Reserve ¾ cup of water and the liquor.

  3. Set aside the soft parts of the clams. Chop the hard parts finely.

Make the soup

  1. Bring the reserved water and clam liquor to a boil.

  2. Strain the boiling liquid.

  3. Thicken the strained liquid with butter and flour.

  4. Scald the milk in a double boiler with the sliced onion. Remove the onion from the milk.

  5. Add the milk and the soft parts of the clams to the stock.

  6. Cook the mixture for 2 minutes.

Serve

  1. Stiff-beat the egg whites.

  2. Pour the soup over the stiff-beaten egg whites.

  3. Serve immediately.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  3. Clam + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together840 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Clams
Provide the main flavor and texture of the soup, with soft parts added to the stock and hard parts chopped fine.
Flour
Thickens the strained clam liquid into a soup with body.
Butter
Enriches the thickened liquid, adding richness and smooth mouthfeel.
Milk
Adds creaminess and mild sweetness, softening the briny clam flavor.
Egg whites
Stiff-beaten to form a light foam that the hot soup is poured over, giving an airy texture.

The step that matters

Pour the soup over the stiff-beaten egg whites. Egg whites must be stiff enough to hold their shape, or the foam collapses into the soup. Serving immediately keeps the foam light before it deflates.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against clam, flour, butter, egg, 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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