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Soup

Leek Milk Soup

A soup made with grits, milk, leek, salt, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 77,875 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Leek Milk Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the soup

  1. Boil the grits in new milk until thick and creamy.

  2. Shred the leek and add it to the mixture.

  3. Stir in salt and sugar.

Serve

  1. Serve hot.

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. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

  2. Milk + leektop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together200 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl butyrate (apple, fruity).

  3. Leek + sugartop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together278 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Grits
Starch swells as it cooks in the milk, thickening the soup and giving it body.
New milk
Cooks down with the grits to make the soup creamy and adds richness.
Leek
Adds a mild onion-like aroma and savoury flavour to the soup.
Sugar
Adds a little sweetness that balances the savoury leek and salt.

The step that matters

Boiling the grits in milk. Milk contains sugars and proteins that scorch easily on the bottom of the pot. Stirring often while the grits swell keeps them from sticking and burning, and gives a smooth, creamy texture.

Swap the leek

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

  1. Sweet potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Leekthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, sugar. 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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