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Tomato Soup

A tomato soup made with tomatoes, ham, onions, carrots, herbs, butter, and sago.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Tomato Soup

Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and 9,057 recipes mention both. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Tomato Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Slice the tomatoes, onion, and carrot.

  2. Cut the ham into small cubes.

Make the soup

  1. Melt the butter in a pot.

  2. Add the ham, carrot, and onion.

  3. Fry for 5 minutes.

  4. Add the tomatoes and herbs.

  5. Cook for another 15 minutes.

  6. Pour in the stock or water.

  7. Cook gently until the vegetables are tender.

  8. Rub the mixture through a wire sieve back into the pot.

  9. Bring the soup to a boil.

  10. Sprinkle in the sago.

  11. Cook until transparent.

Finish and serve

  1. Season to taste with salt, pepper, and a pinch of sugar.

  2. Serve.

  3. Serve croutons or small slices of fried or toasted bread separately.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together8,053 recipes

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

  3. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together34,122 recipes

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

  4. Carrot + thymetop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together4,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Thyme + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together11,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Provide the main body, colour and sharp, sweet-acid flavour of the soup.
Sago
Thickens the soup as its starch swells and turns it clear when cooked.
Butter
Carries flavour and adds richness when it is melted to start the vegetables.
Ham
Adds savoury, meaty depth to the base as it fries with the vegetables.
Onion
Softens and sweetens as it cooks, building the aromatic base of the soup.
Carrot
Adds sweetness and body to the purée once cooked and sieved.

The step that matters

Adding the sago. Sago must be sprinkled in while the soup is simmering and stirred in well, or it clumps and thickens unevenly. Cook until the grains turn transparent so the starch is fully swollen and the soup has no raw, cloudy grains.

Flavor stand-ins for the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, ham, butter, carrot, parsley, thyme, pepper):

  1. Capsicumbetter flavor fit
  2. Parsnipbetter flavor fit
  3. Potatobetter flavor fit
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, ham, butter, carrot, parsley, thyme, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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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