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Soup

Cream of Green Corn

A creamy soup made from green corn, leek, parsley, spices, stock, béchamel, egg yolks, and sweet cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Cream of Green Corn

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Remove the kernels from the green corn.

  2. Combine the leek, parsley, peppercorns, mace, and butter in a deep saucepan.

  3. Cook the mixture gently for 15 minutes without browning.

Make the soup

  1. Add the corn and enough strong white stock to make the soup.

  2. Bring the soup to a boil.

  3. Reduce to a simmer and cook for 1 hour.

  4. Remove the parsley faggot and strain the mixture through a puree sieve.

  5. Return the soup to a clean saucepan.

  6. Stir in the béchamel sauce.

  7. Simmer gently for a few more minutes.

  8. Season with salt and Cayenne pepper.

Finish and serve

  1. Finish with a mixture of egg yolks and sweet cream.

  2. Serve in a soup tureen with slices of buttered toast on the side.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Leek + parsleytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together759 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  3. Corn + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,324 recipes

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

  4. Corn + parsleytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together943 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Leek + peppertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together965 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Green corn
Provides the main flavour and body of the soup, with sweetness from its kernels.
Butter
Adds richness and carries the aromatics' flavour during the gentle initial cooking.
Egg yolks
Thicken the soup and give it a smooth, rich texture when added off the heat.
Sweet cream
Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel to the finished soup.
Bechamel sauce
Adds body and creaminess, helping the soup feel thick and smooth.

The step that matters

Finish with egg yolks and cream. Egg yolks can curdle or scramble if they boil. Add them to the soup off the heat or at very low heat, stirring constantly, so they thicken it smoothly.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (corn, leek, parsley, butter, sauce, pepper, egg):

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against corn, leek, parsley, butter, sauce, pepper, egg. 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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