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Black Bean Soup

A hearty soup made from soaked black beans, spices, and Madeira wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Black Bean Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the beans

  1. Drain the soaked black beans and place them in a pot.

  2. Cover the beans with fresh cold water and bring to a boil.

  3. Cook until the beans are soft and begin to break apart.

  4. Strain the beans, then return them to the pot.

Finish the soup

  1. Add salt, nutmeg, mace, cloves, and Madeira wine.

  2. Stir well and heat through 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. Nutmeg + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Nutmeg + macetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Mace + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  4. Beans + nutmegtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together267 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  5. Beans + clovetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together908 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

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

What each ingredient does

Black beans
Form the body of the soup as they soften and break down into a thick texture.
Madeira wine
Adds sweetness and a rich, aromatic depth to the soup.
Nutmeg
Contributes warm, aromatic spice flavor.
Mace
Adds a warm, aromatic spice flavor similar to nutmeg.
Cloves
Contributes intense, aromatic spice flavor in small amounts.

The step that matters

Cook until the beans are soft and begin to break apart. Beans must be fully tender before straining; undercooked beans stay firm and grainy, while thorough softening lets them release starch and break down into a smooth, thick body.

Swap the beans

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (nutmeg, mace, clove, madeira wine):

  1. Chestnutfits better
  2. Walnutfits better
  3. Almondfits better
  4. Beansthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against nutmeg, mace, clove, madeira wine. 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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