Why it works: Asparagus and spinach match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 274 recipes. Both carry 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol, which smells clove, smoky. The science ↓
Asparagus Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Remove the green tops from the asparagus and set half aside.
Make the soup
Boil the remaining asparagus until completely dissolved, then strain out the solids.
Add the reserved asparagus tops to the soup and boil for about 20 minutes.
For a deeper green color, add the juice of pounded spinach about 15 minutes before serving.
Serve
Serve the soup with small squares of toast.
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.
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Asparagus + spinachtop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together274 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol (clove, smoky).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Asparagus
- Provides the main flavor, body and green color of the soup.
The step that matters
Adding the spinach juice late. Chlorophyll breaks down under prolonged heat, so the spinach juice can turn dull olive if it boils too long. Adding it about 15 minutes before serving helps keep the green bright.
“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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