Why it works: Cream and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and 43,450 recipes mention both. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓
Green Pea Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Make the soup
Boil the stock in a saucepan.
Add the green peas, parsley, and salt; cook until tender.
Pass the mixture through a sieve into a clean saucepan.
Bring it to a boil, then add the cream and sugar.
Serve
Serve hot.
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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.
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Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
-
Peas + parsleytop 13% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together1,885 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
-
Cream + parsleytop 29% of all pairsAroma overlaplowMentioned together6,392 recipes
Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).
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Peas + creamtop 29% of all pairsAroma overlaplowMentioned together1,400 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
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Peas + sugartop 31% of all pairsAroma overlaplowMentioned together1,928 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Green peas
- Provide the main body and vegetable flavour of the soup.
- Stock
- Forms the liquid base that carries the flavour of the soup.
- Cream
- Adds richness and a smooth, silky mouthfeel to the soup.
- Castor sugar
- Rounds out the flavour and softens the vegetable's natural bitterness.
The step that matters
Cook the peas until tender before sieving. Peas must be fully softened so the sieved purée becomes smooth; undercooked peas leave a grainy texture and a raw, starchy taste that the sieve cannot fix.
Flavor stand-ins for the parsley
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (peas, cream, sugar):
- Nutmegbetter flavor fit
- Cinnamonbetter flavor fit
- Mintbetter flavor fit
- Parsleythe original
Fit is the average pairing score against peas, cream, sugar. 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.
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