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Kidney Soup

A soup made with ox kidney, stock, water, vegetables, herbs, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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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 ↓

Kidney Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the kidney

  1. Remove the skin from the kidney, wash and dry it.

  2. Cut the kidney into small pieces, discarding the core.

Make the soup

  1. In a pot, melt the dripping over medium heat.

  2. Add the flour and stir to make a roux, cooking for a few minutes.

  3. Pour in the stock and water, stirring to combine.

  4. Add the kidney pieces, turnip, carrot, onion, herbs, mace, and peppercorns.

  5. Season with salt to taste and bring to a boil.

  6. Reduce heat and simmer for about 1 hour, then serve.

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. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Marjoram + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

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

  5. Turnip + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Ox-kidney
Provides the main meat and rich, savory flavor of the soup.
Flour
Forms a roux with the dripping that thickens the stock into a smooth soup.
Dripping
Adds fat for cooking the roux and carries savory, meaty flavor.
Stock
Forms the liquid base, adding savory depth as the soup simmers.

The step that matters

Cooking the roux. Flour must cook in the melted fat for a few minutes so its raw starch taste fades and it thickens the liquid smoothly instead of forming lumps when the stock is added.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, turnip, carrot, onion, thyme, marjoram, parsley):

  1. Winter savoryfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Sagefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, turnip, carrot, onion, thyme, marjoram, parsley. 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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