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Tomato Soup

A tomato soup with butter, flour, ham, vegetables, and beef extract.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Tomato Soup

Why it works: Carrot and turnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and 8,002 recipes mention both. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Tomato Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan.

  2. Add the cleaned and chopped vegetables and fry for about 5 minutes.

  3. Stir in the flour, spices, and seasoning, then add the sliced tomatoes and ham.

Simmer

  1. Dissolve the Liebig extract in 4 cups of warm water and add it to the pot along with the salt and pepper.

  2. Stir until the soup boils, then let it simmer for 1 hour.

Strain and serve

  1. Rub the soup through a wire sieve, bring it to a boil again, and serve with fried bread.

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 + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Turnip + oniontop 5% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together7,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Tomato + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together3,606 recipes

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

  4. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together21,601 recipes

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

  5. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together17,092 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

Fresh tomatoes
Form the bulk of the soup and supply its main acidity and fresh flavor.
Butter
Carries the vegetables' flavor and adds richness as the base fat.
Flour
Thickens the soup as it cooks in the fat and liquid.
Onion
Builds a savory aromatic base as it softens and browns in butter.
Ham or lean bacon
Adds savory, salty depth to the broth.
Carrot
Adds gentle sweetness and body as it softens during simmering.

The step that matters

Stir in the flour, spices, and seasoning, then add the sliced tomatoes and ham.. Flour must be stirred into the fat and vegetables so it is evenly coated and cooks briefly before liquid goes in. Constant stirring prevents lumps and lets the starch thicken the soup smoothly.

Flavor stand-ins for the turnip

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, butter, flour, ham, carrot, beef, onion):

  1. Potatobetter flavor fit
  2. Okraabout as good a flavor fit
  3. Leekabout as good a flavor fit
  4. Turnipthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, butter, flour, ham, carrot, beef, onion. 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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