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Soup

French Vegetable Soup

A lamb and vegetable soup simmered for three hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and turnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,002 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

French Vegetable Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the lamb and place it in a large pot with cold water.

  2. Skim off any scum that rises to the surface.

Make the soup

  1. Add the chopped carrot first, as it requires the most boiling.

  2. Next, add the chopped potato, turnip, tomato, and cabbage.

  3. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

  4. Let the soup boil for about three hours 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. Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Turnip + cabbagetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together897 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Carrot + potatotop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,107 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  4. Potato + tomatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,798 recipes

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

  5. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 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

Lamb
Provides the meat and rich flavor that give the soup its body.
Carrot
Adds sweetness and color, and holds its shape through long simmering.
Potato
Thickens the broth slightly as its starch releases during simmering.
Turnip
Adds a mildly peppery, earthy flavor to the broth.
Tomato
Adds acidity and savory depth to the broth.
Cabbage
Adds bulk and a subtle sweetness as it softens in the broth.

The step that matters

Adding the carrot first. Carrots are dense and need the longest cooking, so adding them with the lamb lets them soften fully. Adding the softer vegetables too early would leave them mushy by the time the soup is done.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lamb, carrot, potato, turnip, cabbage, pepper):

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lamb, carrot, potato, turnip, cabbage, 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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