Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
Cream' of Carrot
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the carrots
Cook the carrots in water until very tender.
Rub half of the cooked carrots through a sieve.
Make the soup
Add the carrot pulp to the white stock and let it simmer for 30 minutes.
Thicken the soup with flour mixed into butter.
Season with sugar and stir in half a cup of cream.
Finish with eggs and cream
Beat the egg yolks with the remaining half cup of cream.
Mix the egg and cream mixture with a little hot soup, then stir it into the soup quickly without boiling.
Pour the soup over the remaining half of the carrots, pressed through a potato sieve.
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.
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Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Carrot + flourtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,029 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Carrots
- Provide the main body, sweetness and colour of the soup once puréed.
- White stock
- Forms the liquid base that carries the carrot flavour.
- Flour
- Thickens the soup so it has a fuller body.
- Butter
- Adds richness and smooth mouthfeel, and carries the flour for thickening.
- Egg yolks
- Thicken and enrich the soup when gently heated, adding silky texture.
- Cream
- Adds richness and a smooth, velvety texture.
The step that matters
Adding the egg and cream mixture. Egg yolks thicken at about 65 to 70°C and scramble if the soup boils. Blending in a little hot soup first, then stirring it in quickly, spreads the heat evenly and keeps the soup smooth.
Swap the carrot
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, flour, butter, sugar, cream, egg):
- Leekfits better
- Chivefits better
- Asparagusfits better
- Carrotthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against veal, flour, butter, sugar, cream, egg. 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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