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Celery Soup

A soup made from celery, onion, butter, water or stock, thickened with flour and milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,012 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Celery Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Wash the celery and cut it into 1‑inch lengths.

  2. Place the celery, onion, and butter in a saucepan and cover closely.

  3. Cook over low heat for a few minutes to sweat the vegetables, shaking the pan occasionally.

  4. Drain off the fat and add the water or stock.

  5. Simmer until the vegetables are tender.

  6. Rub the mixture through a sieve.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. Mix the flour with cold water to form a smooth paste.

  2. Add boiling milk to the paste to make a pint of white sauce.

  3. Combine the white sauce with the celery pulp and add pepper to taste.

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. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Celery + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Celery
Forms the main body and flavour of the soup once cooked and sieved.
Butter
Fat that sweats the vegetables gently, carrying flavour without browning them.
Flour
Thickens the milk into a white sauce that gives the soup body.
Milk
Adds creaminess and richness to the thickened soup.

The step that matters

Cook the flour paste smooth before adding milk. Flour must be mixed fully into cold water first so it does not clump. Adding boiling milk to a smooth paste lets starch granules swell evenly, giving a smooth white sauce without lumps.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (celery, butter, flour, milk, pepper):

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against celery, butter, flour, milk, pepper. 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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