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Bisque Soup

A tomato and rice bisque soup made with onion, celery, milk, salt, pepper, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,377 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Bisque Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Cook the tomatoes, rice, onion, and celery in a double boiler for one hour.

  2. Add a tiny bit of baking soda.

  3. Strain or rub the mixture through a colander.

Finish the soup

  1. Add the milk, salt, and pepper.

  2. Heat the soup.

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 + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Tomato + ricetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,065 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Provide the main flavor, acidity, and liquid body of the soup.
Rice
Breaks down during long cooking and helps thicken the strained soup.
Milk
Adds creaminess, richness, and a smooth, mellow body to the tomato base.
Baking soda
Neutralizes some tomato acid, which lowers the chance of the milk curdling.

The step that matters

Add the milk, salt, and pepper.. Tomatoes are acidic, and acid can cause milk proteins to curdle, especially when hot. The small amount of baking soda added earlier neutralizes some of that acid. Keep the soup from boiling once the milk goes in so it stays smooth.

Swap the onion

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, rice, celery, 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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