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Cabbage Soup

A hearty soup of cabbage, potatoes, and dripping simmered in hot water, served with toasted bread and optional cheese.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Cabbage and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,081 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Cabbage Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the cabbage into thin strips.

  2. Half boil the potatoes.

Cook the soup

  1. Add the potatoes and cabbage to a pot with dripping, salt, and pepper.

  2. Pour in hot water and boil quickly for 30 minutes.

  3. Reduce heat and simmer for 1.5 hours.

  4. Pulp the vegetables with a spoon, then boil the pulped mixture once more.

Serve

  1. Serve with cut toasted bread and sprinkle with cheese 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. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Bread + cheesetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,130 recipes

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

  3. Cabbage + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together275 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Potato + cheesetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together959 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

What each ingredient does

Cabbage
Forms the bulk of the soup and, after long simmering, gives it a soft, savoury body.
Potatoes
Break down when pulped, thickening the soup and giving it a smoother texture.
Dripping
Adds fat that carries flavour and gives the soup a richer mouthfeel.

Swap the cabbage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, pepper, bread, cheese):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Tomatofits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, pepper, bread, cheese. 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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