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Semolina Soup a LA Palermo

A soup made with semolina, egg yolks, cream, spices, and game consommé, finished with Parmesan.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 13,015 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Semolina Soup a LA Palermo

Ingredients

Directions

Make the pasta

  1. Mix wheaten flour and Turkish wheat flour on a clean surface.

  2. Make a hollow in the center and add egg yolks, cream, pepper, salt, and nutmeg.

  3. Knead into a firm paste and roll it out thinly.

  4. Cut into 1-inch bands and shred to resemble vermicelli.

  5. Dry the shreds on a baking sheet for 4 hours.

Cook and serve

  1. Add the shreds to boiling game consommé and simmer gently for 15 minutes.

  2. Skim the soup and add a pinch of minionette pepper before serving.

  3. Serve with grated Parmesan cheese 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. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  2. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Wheat + nutmegtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together359 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  4. Flour + wheattop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,373 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Cream + nutmegtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,920 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

What each ingredient does

Wheaten flour
Provides the main starch structure that holds the dough together and gives the shreds body.
Turkish wheat flour
Adds gluten-forming protein so the paste knits into a firm dough that holds its shape.
Egg yolks
Add richness and fat, and help bind the dough into a smooth, pliable paste.

The step that matters

Knead into a firm paste and roll it out thinly. The dough must be firm enough to roll and shred cleanly. Too much liquid makes it sticky, while under-kneading leaves it weak and likely to break apart in the consommé.

“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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