Name: Crayfish or Praiun Soup
Ingredients: 3 quarts cold water; 2 onions; 2 carrots, cut into pieces; some parsley; 12 black peppercorns; 12 Jamaica peppercorns; 100 crayfish, small claws and shells removed; crusts of bread

Why it works: Carrot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,053 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Crayfish or Praiun Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

Boil the small crayfish in cold water until near boiling, then skim the surface.
Add onions, carrots, parsley, and peppercorns to the boiling water.
Pound the crayfish shells and claws finely.
Boil the crushed shells and claws with the broth for about an hour.

Finish the soup

Strain the broth and add crusts of bread to thicken it.

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.

Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together8,053 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together21,601 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together25,843 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Parsley + breadtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,588 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Onion + breadtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,676 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Crayfish: Provides the main flavour, and the shells and claws release savoury taste into the broth.
Crusts of bread: Absorb liquid and swell, thickening the broth to a fuller body.
Onions: Add savoury sweetness and aroma as they soften and release flavour into the broth.
Carrots: Add gentle sweetness and body to the broth as they cook.

The step that matters

Boil the crushed shells and claws with the broth. Shells and claws are where much of the crayfish flavour and colour sit. Pounding them first exposes more surface so the broth extracts more flavour during the hour of simmering.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (carrot, parsley, crayfish, bread):

Shallotfits better
Parsnipfits better
Turnipfits better
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against carrot, parsley, crayfish, bread. 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.

Brown Bread461 recipes

Carrot Soup134 recipes

White Bread80 recipes

Bread Omelette60 recipes

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Crayfish or Praiun Soup