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Oyster Soup

A soup made with oysters, water, butter, onion, celery, salt, pepper, and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and 16,012 recipes mention both. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Oyster Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Shuck the oysters and reserve the liquor.

  2. Combine water, butter, chopped onion, and celery in a pot.

  3. Simmer until soft.

Cook and finish

  1. Add the reserved oyster liquor and oysters.

  2. Cook until oysters are just firm.

  3. Season with salt and pepper.

  4. Stir in cream 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.

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. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together16,012 recipes

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

  2. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together41,516 recipes

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

  4. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together68,474 recipes

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

  5. Oyster + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together8,184 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Oysters
Provide the main flavour and tender texture when cooked gently.
Butter
Adds richness and a rounded, savoury flavour to the broth.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, mellow body to the finished soup.
Onion
Builds a sweet, aromatic base for the broth.
Celery
Contributes aromatic, savoury depth to the base.

The step that matters

Cook until oysters are just firm. Oysters toughen and shrink when overcooked, so they should be removed from heat as soon as their edges firm up.

Flavor stand-ins for the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (oyster, butter, celery, pepper, cream):

  1. Potatobetter flavor fit
  2. Spinachabout as good a flavor fit
  3. Carrotabout as good a flavor fit
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against oyster, butter, celery, pepper, 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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