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Tomato Soup

A tomato soup made with canned tomatoes, water, spices, onion, sugar, salt, and a roux of butter and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Tomato Soup

Why it works: Tomato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and 20,633 recipes mention both. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Tomato Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the tomato base

  1. Combine tomatoes, water, peppercorns, cloves, bay leaf, onion, sugar, and salt in a pot.

  2. Simmer for 20 minutes.

  3. Press mixture through a sieve to remove solids, yielding about 1 quart of liquid.

Finish the soup

  1. Melt butter in a pan.

  2. Stir in flour to make a roux.

  3. Gradually add strained tomato liquid to the roux, stirring until smooth and heated through.

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. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together20,633 recipes

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

  2. Tomato + clovetop 12% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together3,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Clove + oniontop 13% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together16,901 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  5. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

Flour and butter share little aroma chemistry, yet 124,287 recipes mention both: they likely work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Cooked tomatoes
Provide the main body and tomato flavour of the soup.
Flour
Thickens the soup when cooked with butter into a roux.
Butter
Forms the roux with flour and adds richness to the soup.
Sugar
Balances the acidity of the tomatoes with mild sweetness.

The step that matters

Adding the tomato liquid to the roux. Adding liquid too quickly or without steady stirring lets flour clump instead of dispersing. Gradual addition while stirring lets starch granules hydrate evenly, giving a smooth, thickened soup.

Flavor stand-ins for the clove

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

  1. Garlicbetter flavor fit
  2. Cinnamonbetter flavor fit
  3. Capersbetter flavor fit
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, onion, sugar, flour, butter. 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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