Skip to main content
Main

Peas Soup

A hearty soup made from split peas, vegetables, herbs, and optional anchovy essence, served with toasted bread and powdered mint.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Thyme and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,225 recipes. Both carry terpineol, which smells pine, woody. The science ↓

Peas Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the split peas in cold water and place them in a saucepan with the liquid.

  2. Add the carrot, celery, onions, thyme, marjoram, black pepper, and cayenne.

Simmer and strain

  1. Simmer gently over low heat for about 3 hours, stirring frequently to prevent sticking.

  2. Strain and press the mixture through a coarse sieve.

Finish and serve

  1. If not using pickled pork or bacon, mix in the essence of anchovy, dripping or butter, and a little salt.

  2. Continue to simmer for another hour, stirring well.

  3. Strain into a soup tureen and serve with toasted bread and powdered mint 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. Thyme + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  2. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Lemon + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together957 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Lemon + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,973 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Carrot + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together687 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Split peas
Form the body of the soup, thickening it as they break down during long simmering.
Dripping or butter
Adds fat and richness, giving the soup a smoother, rounder mouthfeel.
Onions
Add savoury sweetness and aroma as they soften and release flavour into the liquid.
Celery
Contributes aromatic flavour to the base as it cooks down.

The step that matters

Stirring during the long simmer. Split peas are starchy and settle on the bottom of the pan, so they scorch and stick easily over the roughly three hours at low heat. Frequent stirring keeps them from burning, which would give a bitter, smoky taste to the whole pot.

Swap the peas

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, carrot, celery, onion, lemon, thyme, marjoram):

  1. Beansfits better
  2. Chickpeafits better
  3. Lentilsfits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, carrot, celery, onion, lemon, thyme, marjoram. 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 split pea soup recipes

Baked 20Yellow 4 See all 228 →

You might also like

Brown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesLemon SauceLemon Sauce236 recipesGreen PeasGreen Peas229 recipesCarrot SoupCarrot Soup134 recipes