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Cream of Rice with Rice Flour, Astor Style

A creamy soup made with rice flour, chicken consomme, butter, almond milk, and egg yolks, garnished with leeks, green onions, and peas.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Cream of Rice with Rice Flour, Astor Style

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Bring 1 gallon of chicken consomme to a boil in a saucepan.

  2. Slowly add ½ pound of rice flour diluted with cold broth while stirring.

  3. If lumpy, strain through a fine sieve.

  4. Return to the saucepan and stir until it boils.

  5. Season with salt, pepper, and nutmeg.

  6. Add the chicken and parsley.

  7. Garnish with leeks and green onions.

  8. Let it boil slowly for 45 minutes.

  9. Skim the soup.

  10. Remove the chicken and parsley.

  11. Strain through a fine sieve.

Finish and serve

  1. Keep the soup warm in a hot water bath.

  2. Stir in ½ pound of butter and 1 pint of almond milk mixed with 6 egg yolks until the butter melts.

  3. Serve the soup garnished with green peas or pearl barley cooked in consomme.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Nutmeg + parsleytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

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

  3. Leek + oniontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,326 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl butyrate (apple, fruity).

  4. Parsley + leektop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together759 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Chicken + ricetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,769 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

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

What each ingredient does

Rice flour
Thickens the consomme into a creamy soup as its starch gelatinizes when heated.
Butter
Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel as it melts into the hot soup.
Egg yolks
Enrich and thicken the soup, adding body and a smooth texture when gently heated.
Almond milk
Adds creaminess and moisture, softening the soup's flavour and body.
Chicken consomme
Forms the flavourful liquid base that carries the whole soup.

The step that matters

Stir in the butter and egg yolk mixture off the boil. Egg yolks thicken and can curdle or scramble if the soup is too hot, so keep it warm rather than boiling once they are added, and stir steadily so the mixture stays smooth.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, rice, flour, pepper, nutmeg, parsley, leek):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Parsnipfits better
  3. Carrotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, rice, flour, pepper, nutmeg, parsley, leek. 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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