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Mock Oyster Soup

A creamy soup made from oyster-plant or salsify, fish, milk, butter, and seasonings, served with oyster crackers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Mock Oyster Soup

Why it works: Milk and butter 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 ↓

Mock Oyster Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the roots

  1. Scrape the oyster-plant or salsify roots and place them in cold water to prevent discoloration.

  2. Cut the roots into thin slices.

  3. Cover the sliced roots with boiling water.

  4. Add the salt codfish or mackerel.

  5. Cover the pot.

Cook and season

  1. Cook for 1 hour.

  2. Remove the fish.

  3. Add the milk.

  4. Add the salt.

  5. Add the black pepper.

  6. Add the butter.

Serve

  1. Pour the soup into a tureen.

  2. Serve with oyster crackers.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Oyster + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,184 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

  3. Oyster + milktop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,933 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

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

  5. Milk + peppertop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together26,984 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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

What each ingredient does

Oyster-plant or salsify roots
Provide the main body and a mild, oyster-like flavour that gives the soup its character.
Salt codfish or mackerel
Adds savory, salty depth to the broth while the roots cook.
Milk
Forms the creamy base of the soup and adds richness and mild sweetness.
Butter
Adds fat for a smooth, rounded mouthfeel and rich flavour.

The step that matters

Preventing discoloration of the roots. Oyster-plant and salsify darken quickly once cut and exposed to air. Holding the scraped roots in cold water slows this browning, keeping the soup pale and appetising.

“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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