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Clam and Cokn Soup

A soup made with canned corn, clam water, and cream, seasoned with onion, pepper, and cayenne.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Clam and Cokn Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup base

  1. Chop the canned corn and add it to 2 cups of water with the onion.

  2. Bring to a boil and let simmer for 20 minutes.

  3. Pass the mixture through a sieve and add the clam water.

Thicken and finish

  1. Melt the butter in a pan, add the flour, and gradually pour in the hot mixture while stirring constantly.

  2. Add salt, black pepper, and cayenne pepper to taste.

  3. Just before serving, stir in the cream.

  4. Garnish with popped corn.

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

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

  2. Corn + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,324 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

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

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

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

  5. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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

Flour
Thickens the soup into a smooth, lightly body-filled broth when cooked with butter.
Butter
Carries the flour and adds richness and a rounded flavour to the soup.
Cream
Adds richness and a silky texture to the finished soup.
Corn
Provides the main body, sweetness and flavour of the soup.
Clam water
Supplies the clam flavour that defines the soup.

The step that matters

Gradually pour in the hot mixture while stirring constantly. Adding hot liquid to flour all at once forms lumps, because the starch clumps before it can disperse. Pouring slowly while stirring keeps the flour evenly suspended so the soup thickens smoothly.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (corn, flour, pepper, clam, butter, cream):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Asparagusfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against corn, flour, pepper, clam, butter, cream. 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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