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Lentil Soup

A hearty soup made with red lentils, onions, carrots, turnip, and water, simmered until thick.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Lentils and turnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 109 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Lentil Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the lentils and place them in a saucepan with the dripping.

  2. Toss over the fire for 5 minutes, then add water.

  3. Boil and skim thoroughly.

Simmer and finish

  1. Chop the vegetables small and add them to the soup.

  2. Season to taste and boil for 2 hours or more until the lentils are soft and the soup is thick.

  3. If the soup becomes too thick, add a little boiling water.

  4. For smoother soup, boil the lentils the evening before, but add vegetables on the day of serving.

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. Lentils + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together109 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Lentils + carrottop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together505 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Onion + turniptop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Red lentils
Break down during long simmering to thicken the soup and give it body.
Onions
Add sweetness and savory depth as they soften into the broth.
Carrots
Contribute gentle sweetness and color while keeping some texture.
Turnip
Adds a mild, slightly peppery flavor and some body to the soup.

The step that matters

Skimming after the first boil. Skimming removes foam and impurities that rise as the water comes to a boil, keeping the broth clean and clear-tasting before the long simmer.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lentils, carrot, turnip):

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Kalefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lentils, carrot, turnip. 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.

More lentil soup recipes

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