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Partridge-soup, a LA Steward

A lentil-based soup with ham, partridges, vegetables, and optional partridge quenelles.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Lentils and pepper work together. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 812 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Partridge-soup, a LA Steward

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup

  1. Boil lentils with broth and vegetables.

  2. Add raw ham and partridges.

  3. Cook until meat is done.

  4. Pass the soup through a sieve.

Finish and serve

  1. Pound lentils with cooked partridge meat.

  2. Dilute with soup stock and sieve again.

  3. Warm the soup without boiling.

  4. Mix in partridge quenelles if using.

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. Lentils + peppertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together812 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Ham + peppertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,058 recipes

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

  3. Lentils + hamtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together24 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

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

What each ingredient does

Lentils
Thicken the soup and give it body when pounded and sieved.
Partridges
Provide the meat and rich flavour of the soup.
Broth
Forms the liquid base that carries the flavour of the soup.
Raw ham
Adds savoury, salty depth to the broth as it cooks.

The step that matters

Warm the soup without boiling. Boiling a soup that has been thickened with pureed lentils and meat can cause it to become grainy or split, and can toughen the partridge quenelles. Gentle heat keeps the texture smooth.

Swap the lentils

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, pepper):

  1. Black-eyed peafits better
  2. Beansfits better
  3. Peasfits about as well
  4. Lentilsthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, 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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