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Clam Soup

A creamy clam soup made with clams, butter, parsley, cream, and hot water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Clam Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Strain the liquor from the clams and place it in a saucepan.

  2. Boil for 10 minutes, skimming well while boiling.

  3. Add 2 quarts of hot water, butter, and parsley.

Finish and serve

  1. Chop the clams finely and add them to the saucepan.

  2. Finally, stir in the cream, salt, and cayenne pepper to taste.

  3. Boil for 5 more minutes and serve, being careful not to let the soup curdle.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Clam + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together840 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Clam + parsleytop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together232 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

What each ingredient does

Clams
Provide the main flavour and body of the soup as the chopped seafood.
Butter
Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel to the broth.
Cream
Adds richness and smoothness, softening the broth's savoury flavour.

The step that matters

Adding the cream and boiling again. Cream can curdle when it is boiled hard or for too long, especially in an acidic or salty liquid. Adding it at the end and keeping the soup at a gentle boil for only 5 minutes helps keep it smooth.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (clam, butter, cream, pepper):

  1. Parsleythe original
  2. Nutmegfits about as well
  3. Celeryfits less well
  4. Garlicfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against clam, butter, cream, 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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