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Turkey Bisque

A rich soup made from a turkey carcass, rice, oysters, and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,810 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Turkey Bisque

Ingredients

Directions

Make the stock

  1. Break the turkey carcass into pieces and place in a large cooker kettle with hot water.

  2. Cover with a clamped lid and cook in the cooker above one hot disc for 2 hours.

  3. Add chopped celery, parsley, bay leaf, peppercorns, salt, and uncooked rice.

  4. Scald the oysters in their liquor, chop them finely, and add them to the soup with their liquor.

  5. Return to the cooker for 1 hour.

Finish and serve

  1. Strain through a coarse sieve, pressing through the rice and as much of the oyster as possible.

  2. Return to the fire, add hot cream, and beat with a Dover beater.

  3. Serve immediately with a spoonful of stiff whipped cream on each portion and pass small croutons.

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. Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Celery + ricetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Parsley + ricetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,762 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Turkey + celerytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together431 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  5. Turkey + oystertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together473 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Turkey carcass
Provides the meat and bones that build the body and flavor of the stock.
Oysters
Add a briny, savory flavor and are pressed through to thicken and season the soup.
Uncooked rice
Breaks down during simmering and pressing, adding body and thickening the bisque.
Hot cream
Adds richness and a smooth, silky texture to the finished soup.

The step that matters

Pressing through the strainer. Pressing the rice and oysters through the sieve releases their starch and flavor into the liquid, which thickens and seasons the bisque. Stopping early leaves the soup thin and less flavorful.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (turkey, celery, rice, oyster, cream):

  1. Nutmegfits about as well
  2. Thymefits about as well
  3. Turmericfits about as well
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against turkey, celery, rice, oyster, cream. 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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