Why it works: Veal and carrot are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,015 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Carrot Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Boil the knuckle of veal in water.
Add the carrots and boil until they can be mashed through a sieve.
Pass the carrots through the sieve and return to the broth.
Stir in the cream and salt.
Boil until smooth and thick, resembling pea soup.
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.
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Veal + carrottop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together3,015 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Veal + creamtop 27% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together3,202 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).
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Carrot + creamtop 29% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,215 recipes
Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Veal knuckle
- Gives the broth its meaty body and savoury flavour.
- Carrots
- Provide the main body, sweetness and colour once mashed through a sieve.
- Cream
- Adds richness and fat, smoothing the texture and softening the flavour.
The step that matters
Boil until smooth and thick, resembling pea soup. Once the cream is added, the soup must be simmered long enough for the starches and fibres from the mashed carrots to thicken it evenly. Boiling too hard or too long after adding cream can cause it to separate or scorch.
Swap the carrot
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, cream):
- Onionfits better
- Leekfits better
- Potatofits better
- Carrotthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against veal, cream. 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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