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Ceeam of Lettuce Soup

A soup made from shredded lettuce, stock, roux, onion, parsley, milk, egg, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

Ceeam of Lettuce Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup

  1. Cook the shredded lettuce in the stock for 30 minutes.

  2. Rub the mixture through a colander and return it to the pot.

  3. Stir in the white roux, minced onion, and parsley.

Finish and serve

  1. Heat the milk in a separate vessel.

  2. Season the milk with salt and pepper.

  3. Stir in the whipped egg.

  4. Pour the mixture into a tureen.

  5. Add the lettuce soup to the tureen.

  6. Serve.

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

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

  3. Lettuce + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,562 recipes

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

  4. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

  5. Lettuce + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,037 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Lettuce
Forms the main body of the soup and gives its green flavour once cooked and strained.
Stock
Serves as the liquid base that carries the lettuce flavour through the soup.
White roux
Thickens the soup so it has a smooth, body-rich texture.
Milk
Adds creaminess and softens the flavour of the soup.
Egg
Enriches the soup and adds further body when heated gently in the liquid.
Onion
Adds savoury aroma and background flavour.

The step that matters

Stirring in the whipped egg. Egg proteins set when heated, so adding it to very hot liquid too quickly can scramble it into lumps instead of silkily enriching the soup. Keeping the soup below a hard simmer and stirring steadily helps it blend smoothly.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lettuce, parsley, milk, pepper, egg):

  1. Spinachfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lettuce, parsley, milk, pepper, 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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