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Sorrel Soup

A soup made with sorrel, lettuce, chervil, butter, flour, water, broth, cream, egg yolks, served with toasted French rolls.

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

Why it works: Sorrel and chervil match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 247 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Sorrel Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the sorrel, lettuce, and chervil into fine shreds.

Make the soup

  1. In a saucepan, melt 6 ounces of butter over medium heat for 25 minutes, stirring with a wooden spoon.

  2. Add 4 tablespoons of flour and cook for 10 minutes, stirring well to avoid lumps.

  3. Slowly add 2 quarts of boiling water, bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer.

  4. Season with salt and pepper.

  5. After 20 minutes, add 1 quart of broth.

Finish the soup

  1. In a bowl, mix 1 pint of cream with 4 egg yolks, beat well, and strain through a sieve.

  2. Stir the cream mixture and remaining 6 ounces of butter into the soup until the butter melts.

Serve

  1. Slice the French rolls, brown them in the oven, and place them in a soup tureen.

  2. Pour the soup over the rolls and serve.

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. Sorrel + cherviltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together247 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Lettuce + cherviltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together396 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Sorrel + lettucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together317 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Sorrel + flourtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together231 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Sorrel
Gives the soup its sharp, lemony acidity and main flavour.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, and with the flour forms the base that thickens the soup.
Flour
Thickens the soup by cooking with the melted butter to form a roux.
Egg yolks
Enrich the soup and thicken it gently when stirred in with the cream.
Cream
Adds richness, smoothness and body to the finished soup.
Lettuce
Adds bulk and a mild, sweet vegetal flavour to the soup.

The step that matters

Add the cream and egg yolk mixture gently. Egg yolks thicken a soup through gentle heat, but if they get too hot they curdle and turn grainy. Stir the mixture in steadily and keep the soup from boiling once it is added.

Swap the lettuce

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sorrel, chervil, butter, flour, pepper, cream, egg):

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Lettucethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sorrel, chervil, butter, flour, pepper, cream, egg. 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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