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Hard Pea Soup

A hearty soup made with split peas, ham or pickled pork stock, celery, carrot, onion, curry powder, cayenne pepper, and crumbled toast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and carrot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Hard Pea Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the peas

  1. Soak the split peas overnight in water with a small amount of baking soda.

  2. Rinse the peas and add them to the stock in a pot.

Cook the soup

  1. Add the celery, carrot, onion, curry powder, and cayenne pepper.

  2. Cover and boil until everything is soft, skimming off any scum.

Strain and serve

  1. Strain the soup into a warmed tureen, pressing the pulp through with a spoon.

  2. Serve hot, adding crumbled toast to the tureen before dishing.

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. Celery + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

  5. Celery + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Split peas
Break down during long boiling to thicken the soup and give it body.
Stock
Supplies the main liquid and savory flavor base of the soup.
Onion
Adds aromatic sweetness and flavor that deepens as it cooks.
Celery
Contributes savory, herbal aroma to the soup base.
Carrot
Adds mild sweetness and color while softening into the soup.

The step that matters

Skimming off any scum while boiling. Foam that rises during boiling contains impurities and proteins that can cloud the soup and taint its flavor. Removing it as it forms keeps the broth clear and clean-tasting.

Swap the peas

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, celery, carrot, onion, pepper):

  1. Beansfits better
  2. Black-eyed peafits better
  3. Lentilsfits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, celery, carrot, onion, 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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