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Asparagus Soup

A soup made from boiled asparagus, blended with onion and butter, seasoned with salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Asparagus Soup

Why it works: Asparagus and onion match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,212 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Asparagus Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup base

  1. Boil 2 quarts of water in a pot.

  2. Add the asparagus tips and cook until tender.

  3. Remove half of the cooked asparagus and blend it through a sieve to thicken the soup.

Add the onion and finish

  1. In a separate pan, melt the butter and fry the chopped onion until soft.

  2. Rub the fried onion through a sieve and add it to the soup.

  3. Add the remaining asparagus pieces and cook until just tender.

  4. Season with salt and serve hot.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Asparagus + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,212 recipes

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

  2. Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Asparagus + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,026 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

Asparagus tips
Form the main body of the soup and, when pureed, give it thickness and body.
Butter
Adds fat and richness when used to fry the onion.
Onion
Softened and sieved into the soup, adding savory flavor and aroma.

The step that matters

Rubbing the cooked asparagus through a sieve. Pushing the cooked asparagus through a sieve breaks down its fibers into a smooth purée that thickens the soup. Skipping this or leaving it too coarse results in a thin, stringy texture.

Swap the asparagus

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, onion):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Asparagusthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, onion. 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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