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Bacon and Potato Chowder

A creamy soup of bacon, potatoes, onions, garlic, and broth thickened with flour and evaporated milk.

From the Recipes Wiki (Fandom) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and garlic match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 29,058 recipes. Both carry furaneol, which smells caramel, strawberry. The science ↓

Bacon and Potato Chowder

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Fry bacon until crisp and chop. Drain and use paper towel to soak up excess fat.

  2. In a large pot, sauté onion and garlic with 2 tbsp. bacon drippings.

Make the chowder

  1. Add potatoes, water, and bouillon cubes to a pot.

  2. Heat to boiling, then cover and simmer until potatoes are cooked, and add bacon.

  3. Mix flour with a small amount of evaporated milk, making a paste. Gradually mix up with the remaining milk. Add to the potato mixture.

  4. Cook over medium heat until mixture comes to a boil and thickens. Stir often to ensure the soup does not burn on the bottom of the pot.

Serve

  1. Serve hot with other dishes. Drizzle with the chili oil and garnish with the parsley, if desired.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

1156Calories
61 gProtein
31 gFat
158 gCarbs

Counts 11 of 12 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 11 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Chicken100g cooked165
Potato1 medium (173g) baked161
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Olive Oil1 tbsp (14g)119
Onion1 medium (110g)44
Bacon1 slice cooked (8g)43
Chili1 tsp (2.7g)8
Clove1 tsp ground (2g)7
Garlic1 clove (3g)4
Parsley1 tbsp chopped fresh (3.8g)1
Waternot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

Recipe from the Recipes Wiki (Fandom).

Steps grouped into stages for easier reading; the method is the source's own.

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. Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together29,058 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  2. Onion + potatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  3. Garlic + potatotop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,517 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  4. Garlic + parsleytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,308 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

Bacon
Adds smoky, salty flavor and rendered fat used to cook the onion and garlic.
Potatoes
Break down partly as they cook, adding body and thickness to the broth.
Flour
Thickens the liquid into a smooth, creamy base when cooked to a boil.
Evaporated milk
Adds richness and creamy body to the chowder.
Onion
Provides savory sweetness and aroma as it softens in the bacon fat.

The step that matters

Stirring the flour-milk mixture into the hot soup. Flour mixed with milk must be fully smooth before it goes in, and the soup must be stirred often. Otherwise lumps form and the bottom can scorch while it thickens.

Swap the parsley

The recipe marks parsley as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, garlic, clove, potato, chicken, flour, evaporated milk):

  1. Cuminfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Turmericfits about as well
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, garlic, clove, potato, chicken, flour, evaporated milk. 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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