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Fish Chowder

A creamy fish chowder made with fish bones, potatoes, onions, milk, and flaked fish served over crackers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Fish Chowder

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Make the fish stock

  1. Cover the fish bones with cold water and let soak for about 20 minutes.

  2. Gradually heat the water and cook until the muscle part is tender.

  3. Drain the liquid.

Prepare the potatoes

  1. Cut the potatoes into dice and cook in boiling water for 5 minutes.

  2. Drain and then cook in the fish stock until tender.

Make the chowder

  1. Brown the onion slightly in 1 tablespoon of butter.

  2. Make a white sauce with the remaining ingredients, except the crackers.

  3. Add the browned onion to the white sauce, strain, and mix in the potatoes and fish stock.

  4. Add 2 tablespoons of flaked fish.

  5. Pour the chowder over crisp crackers in a hot serving dish and serve hot.

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

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

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

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

  3. Potato + milktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

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

  4. Fish + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,488 recipes

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

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Fish
Provides the main flavor and body, with bones and trimmings giving the stock its taste.
Potatoes
Add starch and bulk, giving the chowder substance and a thicker texture.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, and carries flavor from the browned onion.
Flour
Thickens the milk into a white sauce that gives the chowder its creamy body.
Milk
Forms the creamy base of the white sauce, adding moisture and richness.

The step that matters

Make the white sauce. Flour must be cooked smoothly into the butter and milk; if added without care, lumps form and the sauce thickens unevenly.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, potato, butter, onion, flour, milk):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Garlicfits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, potato, butter, onion, flour, 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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