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Winter Pea Soup

A soup made from soaked white peas, broth, chorizo or smoked beef, served with mint and fried bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Peas and mint are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,137 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-ol, which smells mushroom, earthy. The science ↓

Winter Pea Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the white peas in water overnight.

Cook and strain

  1. Boil the peas in enough water to cover them until soft.

  2. Pass the cooked peas through a sieve.

Finish and serve

  1. Add the sieved peas to the prepared broth.

  2. Stir in a small piece of chorizo or smoked beef to enhance flavor.

  3. Serve the soup with fresh mint and fried bread.

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. Peas + minttop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,137 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  2. Peas + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together804 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexyl acetate (fruity, apple).

  3. Beef + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  4. Peas + beeftop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,044 recipes

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

  5. Mint + breadtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together244 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

White peas
Form the body of the soup once cooked and sieved into a thick purée.
Broth
Provides the liquid base and savory flavor for the soup.
Chorizo or smoked beef
Adds smoky, savory aroma and fat to the soup.

The step that matters

Cooking the peas until soft. Dried peas must be cooked fully until tender; undercooked peas stay grainy and will not purée smoothly through the sieve, leaving a gritty texture.

Swap the mint

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (peas, beef, bread):

  1. Mintthe original
  2. Pepperfits about as well
  3. Celeryfits less well
  4. Marjoramfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against peas, beef, bread. 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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