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Skate Soup

A soup made with skate, leeks, onions, parsley, flour, and milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Leek and onion match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,326 recipes. Both carry ethyl butyrate, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Skate Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Clean and cut the skate into pieces.

  2. Chop the leeks, parsley, and onions.

Cook the soup

  1. In a pot, melt butter and sauté the leeks and onions until soft.

  2. Add the skate pieces and enough water to cover them, then bring to a boil.

  3. Simmer until the skate is cooked through.

  4. Thicken the soup with flour mixed in water if desired.

  5. Stir in the milk 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 their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Leek + oniontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,326 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl butyrate (apple, fruity).

  2. Leek + parsleytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together759 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  3. Leek + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together328 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

  5. Parsley + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Skate
Provides the main body and flavour of the soup as it cooks through.
Leeks
Soften during sautéing to build a mild, sweet aromatic base.
Onions
Soften and sweeten during sautéing, adding depth to the soup base.
Flour
Thickens the cooking liquid into a smoother, more body-rich soup.
Milk
Adds creaminess and richness to the finished soup.

The step that matters

Thicken the soup with flour mixed in water. Flour must be mixed smoothly with water before adding, otherwise it forms lumps instead of thickening the liquid evenly as starch gelatinises with heat.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (leek, parsley, flour, milk):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Parsnipfits better
  3. Turnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against leek, parsley, flour, milk. 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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