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Maryland Chowder

A stew of haddock, oysters or clams, water crackers, butter, cream, onions, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Haddock and cream work together. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 181 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Maryland Chowder

Ingredients

Directions

Layer the chowder

  1. In a saucepan or clean iron pot, add the water and sliced onion.

  2. Layer half of the fish skin-side down, then sprinkle with half of the salt, black pepper, mace, and cayenne.

  3. Add half of the oysters or clams, followed by half of the butter in small lumps and half of the crackers.

  4. Repeat the layers with the remaining fish, oysters, seasonings, butter, and crackers.

  5. Pour the boiled cream over the top.

  6. If the oysters or clams have a lot of liquor, you may not need the water.

Cook and serve

  1. Cover tightly and stew for 30 minutes.

  2. Serve on a platter.

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. Haddock + creamtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together181 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  4. Butter + oystertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,184 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

  5. Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Haddock
Forms the flaky body of the chowder as it stews.
Water crackers
Soak up liquid and thicken the chowder as they break down.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, rounded mouthfeel to the layers.
Oysters or clams
Contribute briny seafood flavour and their own liquor to the broth.
Cream
Adds richness and body to the finished chowder.

The step that matters

Cover tightly and stew gently. Keeping the pot covered holds in steam so the fish cooks evenly and the crackers soften without the liquid evaporating. Boiling hard would toughen the fish and break it into fragments.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (haddock, butter, oyster, cream, onion, pepper):

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against haddock, butter, oyster, cream, onion, pepper. 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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