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Lentil Soup

A hearty lentil soup with carrots, turnip, parsnip, onions, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Turnip and parsnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 590 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Lentil Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the lentils thoroughly in several waters until clean.

  2. Soak the lentils in cold water overnight.

Cook

  1. Put the soaked lentils in a pot with the soaking water and enough additional water to make 2 quarts.

  2. Bring to a boil, then add the chopped carrot, turnip, parsnip, and onions.

  3. Add a small pinch of carbonate of soda.

  4. Boil for 2 hours, then strain through a colander, washing the lentils except for the skins.

Finish and serve

  1. Return the strained soup to the pot to warm.

  2. Season with pepper and salt, 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.

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. Turnip + parsniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together590 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Carrot + parsniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,097 recipes

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

  3. Lentils + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together109 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Lentils + parsniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together42 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Lentils
Provide the main body and thickness of the soup as they soften and break down during long simmering.
Carrot
Adds natural sweetness and body to the soup as it cooks down.
Onions
Build savory depth and aroma as they soften in the liquid.
Carbonate of soda
Raises the pH of the cooking liquid, which helps lentils soften more fully during the long boil.

The step that matters

Boil for 2 hours, then strain. The long simmer is what softens the lentils and vegetables fully. Stopping early leaves them firm, and straining too coarsely leaves skins and grit in the soup.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lentils, carrot, turnip, parsnip, pepper):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Beetrootfits better
  3. Kalefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lentils, carrot, turnip, parsnip, 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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