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Potato Soup

A soup made from potatoes, celery, onion, milk, butter, and parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Potato Soup

Why it works: Celery and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,810 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Potato Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Peel, wash, and cut the potatoes into pieces.

  2. Peel and roughly chop the onion.

  3. Prepare and cut the celery into small pieces.

Make the soup

  1. Cook the vegetables in 3 pints of water until soft.

  2. Rub the mixture through a sieve and return it to the saucepan.

  3. Add the milk, butter, and seasoning, and bring the soup to a boil.

  4. If the soup is too thick, add more water.

  5. Mix in the parsley just before serving.

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.

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 their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  4. Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

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

  5. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Break down when cooked and sieved, giving the soup its thick, smooth body.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, rounding out the flavour and mouthfeel of the soup.
Milk
Adds creaminess and softness to the smooth soup base.
Spanish onion
Contributes savoury sweetness and aroma as it softens in the cooking water.

The step that matters

Rub the mixture through a sieve. Pushing the cooked vegetables through a sieve breaks down their cell walls into a smooth purée. Skipping or rushing this leaves the soup grainy and uneven in texture.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, celery, milk, butter, parsley, pepper):

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, celery, milk, butter, parsley, 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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