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A Cheap Green Peas Soup

A soup made from pea pods, green peas, cucumbers, lettuce, onion, herbs, and butter, simmered and blended.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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A Cheap Green Peas Soup

Why it works: Cucumber and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,409 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

A Cheap Green Peas Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pea liquor

  1. Wash the pea pods thoroughly and place them in boiling salted water for 20 to 30 minutes until tender.

  2. Strain the pods and press them with a wooden spoon to extract the liquid.

  3. Measure the liquid and pour 2 quarts into a clean deep saucepan.

  4. Bring to a boil.

Make the soup

  1. Stew the thinly sliced onion in a little butter.

  2. Add 1 quart of green peas.

  3. Add 2 to 3 peeled and quartered cucumbers.

  4. Add 3 chopped lettuces.

  5. Add the stewed onion.

  6. Add parsley and mint leaves.

  7. Simmer gently for 1 hour.

  8. Season with salt and fine white pepper or cayenne to taste.

  9. Blend the soup through a fine sieve.

  10. Reheat.

Serve

  1. Serve with small fried bread sippets.

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.

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.

  1. Cucumber + lettucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,409 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Lettuce + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,483 recipes

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

  4. Cucumber + minttop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together884 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Peas + lettucetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,293 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

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

What each ingredient does

Pea pods
Boiled and pressed to extract the flavourful liquid that forms the soup base.
Green peas
Add body, sweetness and their green colour to the finished soup.
Lettuces
Contribute soft body and a mild, fresh vegetable flavour to the soup.
Cucumbers
Add a light, fresh flavour and watery texture that thins the purée.
Onion
Stewed in butter first, adding savoury depth to the soup.
Butter
Adds fat and rich flavour when used to stew the onion.

The step that matters

Blend the soup through a fine sieve. Pressing the cooked vegetables through a fine sieve removes fibrous pieces and skins, giving a smooth, even texture. Skipping or rushing this step leaves the soup grainy.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (peas, cucumber, lettuce, onion, butter, parsley, mint):

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against peas, cucumber, lettuce, onion, butter, parsley, mint. 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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