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Potato Soup

A creamy potato soup made with milk, butter, flour, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Potato Soup

Why it works: Celery and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,810 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Potato Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Cook the potatoes in boiling salted water until soft, then drain and rub through a strainer.

  2. Scald the milk with the onion, then remove the onion.

  3. Slowly add the milk to the potatoes, stirring constantly.

Make the sauce and finish

  1. Melt the butter.

  2. Add the flour, celery salt, salt, pepper and cayenne, and stir until well mixed.

  3. Add the mixture to the hot soup along with the minced parsley.

  4. Cook for one minute before serving.

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. Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  4. Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Provide the starch and body that thicken the soup when mashed smooth.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the soup and adds richness and mild sweetness.
Butter
Adds fat and flavour, and helps the flour form a smooth roux.
Flour
Thickens the soup by absorbing the melted butter and swelling in the hot liquid.

The step that matters

Add the milk slowly while stirring. Pouring the warm milk into the potato purée gradually and stirring constantly keeps the mixture smooth and evenly blended instead of lumpy.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, potato, butter, flour, celery, pepper, parsley):

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Parsnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, potato, butter, flour, celery, pepper, parsley. 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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