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Vermicelli Soup

A broth of stock, vegetables, and vermicelli, thickened with bread crumbs and finished with egg yolk and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Vermicelli Soup

Why it works: Carrot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and 8,053 recipes mention both. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Vermicelli Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the stock

  1. Make 4 quarts of good stock with carrot, turnip, onions, parsley roots, mace, salt, and white pepper.

  2. Strain the stock and remove all the fat.

Thicken the soup

  1. Boil the crumb of 3 French rolls in some of the stock until soft enough to mash smooth.

  2. Add the mashed rolls to the boiling soup and stir well.

  3. Boil for 15 minutes.

  4. Mix 2 beaten egg yolks with 3 tablespoons of cream and add to the soup.

Cook the vermicelli and serve

  1. Boil 2-3 ounces of vermicelli in water for 15-20 minutes, then strain.

  2. Place the vermicelli in a tureen and pour the soup over it.

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

  1. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together8,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Carrot + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together8,001 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Mace + white peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together1,695 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  4. Carrot + oniontop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together21,599 recipes

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

  5. Turnip + parsleytop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together2,842 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

French rolls
Soften and mash to thicken the soup body.
Egg yolks
Enrich the soup and thicken it slightly when added off the boil.
Cream
Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel to the soup.
Vermicelli
Provides the noodle texture that the soup is served over.

The step that matters

Adding the egg yolks and cream. If the soup is kept at a hard boil after the egg yolks go in, the proteins in the yolks can scramble and curdle, leaving the soup grainy. Stirring the yolk and cream mixture in gently keeps the soup smooth.

Flavor stand-ins for the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (carrot, turnip, onion, parsley, mace, egg, cream):

  1. Celerybetter flavor fit
  2. Nutmegbetter flavor fit
  3. Marjorambetter flavor fit
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against carrot, turnip, onion, parsley, mace, egg, cream. 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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