Skip to main content
Main

Old Peas Soup

A hearty soup made with old split peas, various meats, vegetables, and dried mint, served with fried bread cubes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Turnip and leek match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and 1,046 recipes mention both. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Old Peas Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Combine the chuck beef, knuckles of ham, veal, pickled pork, turnips, leeks, onions, carrots, celery, and split peas in a large pot.

  2. Add enough water to cover the ingredients and bring to a boil.

  3. Skim off any foam that rises to the surface.

  4. Add the dried mint and let the soup boil until all ingredients are tender.

  5. Remove the mint and strain the soup through a tamis until it reaches a good thickness.

Finish and serve

  1. Return the strained soup to the pot and add diced turnips, small-cut celery, and leeks.

  2. Bring the soup back to a boil, skim again, and season with pepper and coarse sea salt.

  3. Add the nearly cooked pickled pork to the soup half an hour before serving.

  4. Serve the soup with fried bread cubes on the side.

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

  1. Turnip + leektop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together1,046 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Turnip + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Beef + porktop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together5,690 recipes

    Shared aroma: 12-methyltridecanal (tallowy, beefy).

  4. Leek + carrottop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together1,310 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Leek + oniontop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together1,326 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl butyrate (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Split peas
Break down during long simmering to thicken the soup and give it body.
Chuck beef
Releases gelatin and savory flavor into the broth during long simmering.
Knuckles of ham
Adds smoky, salty depth and collagen that enriches the broth.
Leeks
Contribute mild onion-like sweetness and aroma to the soup.
Turnips
Add mild sweetness and soft texture once cooked through.
Pickled pork
Adds salty, tangy meatiness that seasons the soup.

The step that matters

Straining through the tamis. Straining breaks down and removes the softened solids to reach a smooth, thick texture. Pushing too little or too much through changes the body, so judge the thickness by eye as it passes.

Flavor stand-ins for the carrot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, ham, veal, pork, turnip, leek, onion):

  1. Chiveabout as good a flavor fit
  2. Carrotthe original
  3. Potatoabout as good a flavor fit
  4. Shallotabout as good a flavor fit

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, ham, veal, pork, turnip, leek, onion. 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.

More pea soup recipes

Green 380Split 228Baked Split 20Creamed 13Dried 10Winter 9 See all 368 →

You might also like

Beef, Mutton, or Veal BrothBeef, Mutton, or Veal Broth6 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesGreen PeasGreen Peas229 recipesRoast BeefRoast Beef211 recipes