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Clam Soup

A soup made from clams, crackers, butter, and milk, simmered and strained.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Clam Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the clams

  1. Wash clams thoroughly, scrubbing with a brush.

  2. Put clams into a kettle, add ½ cup water, cover closely, and let steam until shells open slightly.

  3. Remove clams from shells and separate soft from hard parts. Chop hard parts.

Make the broth

  1. Add clam liquor and 1 cup water. Bring slowly to a boil and let simmer for 45 minutes.

  2. Strain through double thickness of cheesecloth.

Finish the soup

  1. Add butter.

  2. Add soft parts of clams.

  3. Add cracker dust.

  4. Add seasonings.

  5. Heat very hot, but do not allow the mixture to reach boiling point.

  6. Turn into a tureen.

  7. Add milk.

  8. Serve immediately or the soup will have a curdled appearance.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Clam + milktop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together636 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

  4. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Pepper + milktop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together26,984 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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

What each ingredient does

Clams
Provide the main flavor and the meaty soft parts of the soup.
Crackers
Crumbled crackers add body and help thicken the soup slightly.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth, rounded mouthfeel.
Milk
Adds creaminess and mild sweetness, mellowing the briny clam flavor.

The step that matters

Heat the soup without boiling it. Milk proteins can coagulate and separate when overheated, so the soup turns curdled and grainy. Keeping it very hot but below boiling keeps the milk smooth and creamy.

“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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