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Clear Royal Soup

A custard made from egg, milk, and clear soup, baked in a mold and served with consommé.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Egg and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 88,785 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Clear Royal Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Beat the egg in a bowl.

  2. Add the milk, salt, and pepper to the egg and mix well.

  3. Pour the mixture into a well-buttered mold.

  4. In a small saucepan, bring water to a boil and place the mold inside.

  5. Cover the mold with greased paper and a close-fitting lid to trap steam.

  6. Cook slowly for 15 minutes or until the custard is firm.

Cut and serve

  1. Once cooled, cut the custard into strips, rounds, or diamonds.

  2. Rinse the shapes in warm water and place them in a tureen.

  3. Pour hot consommé over the custard shapes.

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. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Egg + peppertop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together50,580 recipes

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

Egg and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 50,580 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

Egg
Sets when heated, giving the custard its firm, sliceable structure.
Milk or white stock
Adds moisture and softness, keeping the custard tender rather than rubbery.
Clear soup
Forms the hot liquid base that the custard shapes are served in.

The step that matters

Cook slowly for 15 minutes or until the custard is firm. Egg proteins set at moderate heat. Cooking too fast or too hot causes the custard to become porous, rough, or rubbery. Gentle steam heat gives a smooth, firm texture that cuts cleanly.

“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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