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Modern Cookery

A soup of apples simmered in broth with ginger and pepper, served hot with boiled rice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Ginger and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,800 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Modern Cookery

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Cook the apples in the broth for 25 to 40 minutes until soft.

  2. Press the mixture through a strainer to create a smooth pulp.

  3. Add the ginger and pepper, then simmer for 2 minutes.

  4. Skim the soup and serve hot with boiled rice.

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. Ginger + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,800 recipes

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

  2. Apple + gingertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,424 recipes

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

  3. Ginger + ricetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,196 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Pepper + ricetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,379 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Apple + ricetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,311 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Apples
Break down into a thick pulp that gives the soup body and natural sweetness.
Broth
Provides the liquid base that cooks the apples and carries the savory flavor throughout.
Powdered ginger
Adds warm, aromatic spice that gives the soup its distinctive flavor.
Black pepper
Contributes a sharp, pungent heat that rounds out the ginger's warmth.

The step that matters

Cook the apples until fully soft before straining. Apples that are not fully softened do not break down into a smooth pulp, so they stay grainy and resist passing through the strainer. Thorough cooking softens the fruit's cell walls and pectin, letting the mixture press through evenly.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ginger, pepper, rice):

  1. Limefits better
  2. Lemonfits better
  3. Mangofits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ginger, pepper, rice. 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.

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