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Green Bean Soup

A soup made from green beans, spinach, parsley, butter, vegetable broth, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper 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 ↓

Green Bean Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beans

  1. Boil the green beans until tender.

  2. Skin and bruise the beans in a bowl until smooth.

Make the soup

  1. In a pan, combine the smooth beans with vegetable broth and butter.

  2. Dredge a little flour into the mixture.

  3. Stir on the heat until it boils.

  4. Add the boiled spinach and parsley, previously rubbed through a sieve, to color the soup.

  5. Feel free to add other vegetables if desired.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Spinach + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,025 recipes

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

  3. Spinach + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  4. Spinach + flourtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,564 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Green beans + spinachtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

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

What each ingredient does

Green beans
Form the main body and thick texture of the soup once puréed.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, giving the soup a smoother mouthfeel.
Flour
Thickens the liquid as it heats, helping the soup hold body.
Vegetable broth
Provides the liquid base that carries the puréed beans.
Spinach
Contributes green color to the soup.

The step that matters

Stir on the heat until it boils. Flour needs to be fully incorporated and brought to a boil to thicken properly. Stirring prevents lumps and scorching on the bottom of the pan.

Swap the green beans

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (spinach, parsley, butter, flour, pepper):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Okrafits better
  4. Green beansthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against spinach, parsley, butter, flour, pepper. 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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