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Potatoe Soup

A hearty soup made with grated potatoes, meat trimmings, rice, celery, and herbs, seasoned with white pepper and sea salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,047 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Potatoe Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup

  1. Grate the potatoes into the water.

  2. Add the meat trimmings, rice, sweet herbs, and celery.

  3. Stew until the liquid is considerably reduced.

Finish

  1. Strain the mixture through a sieve.

  2. If the soup is too thin, add a little thickening.

  3. Season with white pepper and coarse sea salt.

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. Potato + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,047 recipes

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

  2. Potato + ricetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together851 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  3. Rice + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,169 recipes

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

  4. Meat + ricetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,481 recipes

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

  5. Potato + meattop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together786 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Break down during stewing to give the soup body and a thick, smooth texture.
Rice
Releases starch as it cooks, helping thicken the soup and add body.
Meat trimmings
Release savory flavor and gelatin into the water as they stew.
Celery
Adds aromatic, vegetal flavor to the stock.

The step that matters

Stew until the liquid is considerably reduced. Reducing concentrates the flavor of the stock and thickens the soup through evaporation and starch release. Stopping too early leaves it thin and bland, which is why the thickening step may be needed.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, meat, rice, celery):

  1. Turmericfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, meat, rice, celery. 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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