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Soup

Cold Gravy Soup

A vegetable soup made with carrot, turnip, onion, tomatoes, rice, and cold gravy or roast drippings.

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 ↓

Cold Gravy Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup

  1. In a soup kettle, combine the carrot, turnip, onion, tomatoes, rice, cold water, salt, and pepper.

  2. Add the cold gravy or drippings.

  3. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer covered for about 3 hours to prevent evaporation.

  4. If the soup is too thick, add water to reach the desired consistency.

Finish and serve

  1. Taste and adjust seasoning as needed, then serve hot.

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 + oniontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

  4. Carrot + tomatotop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,606 recipes

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

  5. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 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

Rice
Releases starch as it simmers, thickening the soup and giving it body.
Cold gravy or drippings
Adds concentrated meaty flavour and fat that carry the soup's savoury taste.
Turnip
Adds mild sweetness and body as it softens during the long simmer.
Tomatoes
Contribute acidity and brightness that balance the rich gravy.

The step that matters

Simmering covered for about 3 hours. A long, covered simmer lets the rice and vegetables soften fully and break down into the broth while the lid limits evaporation. Too vigorous a boil can scorch the bottom or cloud the soup.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (carrot, turnip, onion, rice, pepper, meat):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against carrot, turnip, onion, rice, pepper, meat. 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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