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Tomato Bisque

A creamy tomato bisque made with canned tomatoes, milk, butter, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Tomato Bisque

Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Tomato Bisque

Ingredients

Directions

Make the milk base

  1. Scald the milk with the onion, spices, parsley, and bread crumbs.

  2. Press the mixture through a sieve.

Make the tomato base

  1. Cook the tomatoes with sugar for 15 minutes.

  2. Add baking soda.

  3. Press the tomatoes through a sieve.

Combine and serve

  1. Reheat the milk to boiling.

  2. Add the tomatoes, butter, and seasonings.

  3. Serve immediately with croutons or crisp crackers.

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 their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Clove + parsleytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,768 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  5. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 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

Milk
Forms the creamy body of the bisque and softens its acidity.
Canned tomatoes
Provide the main tomato flavour and the bulk of the soup.
Baking soda
Neutralises some tomato acidity, so the milk is less likely to curdle.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, rounded mouthfeel.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the tomatoes with a touch of sweetness.

The step that matters

Add baking soda to the tomatoes. Tomatoes are acidic, and acid can curdle milk when they meet. Baking soda neutralises some of that acid, so the bisque stays smooth. Adding it too much can leave a soapy, flat taste.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, sugar, clove, parsley, bread, milk, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Eggplantfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, sugar, clove, parsley, bread, milk, 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.

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