Skip to main content
Soup

Lettuce and Whole-pea Soup

A soup made with blanched cabbage lettuces, whole peas, bacon, consommé, and duchess crusts.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Cabbage and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 622 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Lettuce and Whole-pea Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the lettuces

  1. Pick, wash, and blanch the lettuces; cut them open and season with pepper and salt.

  2. Pair the lettuces face to face and tie them with twine.

Braise

  1. Cover the bottom of a stewpan with bacon, place the lettuces on top, and pour broth over them.

  2. Cover with buttered paper and a lid, bring to a boil, then simmer gently for about 1 hour.

  3. Drain the lettuces, untie them, and cut into 1-inch lengths.

Assemble and serve

  1. In a soup tureen, combine the lettuces, boiled peas, and a pinch of pepper.

  2. Remove fat from the braising broth and add it to the tureen.

  3. Pour in the consomme, check for seasoning, and add duchess crusts 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. Cabbage + lettucetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together622 recipes

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

  2. Lettuce + peastop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,293 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  3. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

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

  4. Lettuce + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,037 recipes

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

  5. Cabbage + peastop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together392 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

White-heart cabbage lettuces
Their leaves become tender and wrap the filling, forming the body of the soup.
Consomme of fowl
Provides the clear, savoury liquid base that carries the soup's flavour.
Young green peas
Add sweetness and a fresh, tender texture to the soup.
Thin layers of fat bacon
Adds savoury fat and aroma to the braising broth and lettuces.

The step that matters

Simmer gently for about 1 hour. A rolling boil can break up the tender lettuces and cloud the broth, so a gentle simmer keeps them intact and the liquid clear.

Swap the peas

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

  1. Chestnutfits better
  2. Beansfits better
  3. Lentilsfits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, lettuce, 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.

You might also like

Meatless Green Pea SoupMeatless Green Pea Soup22 recipesIndian Spiced Potato Soup with Tofu and SpinachIndian Spiced Potato Soup with Tofu and Spinach448 recipesClear Carrot and Bottle Gourd SoupClear Carrot and Bottle Gourd Soup65 recipesMock Bisque SoupMock Bisque Soup51 recipes