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Clam and Oyster Chowder

A hearty soup made with clams, oysters, potatoes, onions, tomatoes, and seasoned with salt pork, butter, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and potato 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 ↓

Clam and Oyster Chowder

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Remove the hard part from the clams and chop the soft part.

  2. In a soup pot, fry the chopped salt pork until crisp.

  3. Add the minced onions and cook until lightly colored.

Simmer the chowder

  1. Stir in the chopped clams, parboiled potatoes, tomatoes, cold water, and seasonings.

  2. Cover and cook for 3 hours.

  3. Mix 2 tablespoons of butter with browned flour and stir into the chowder.

  4. Add the oysters and simmer for 10 minutes before serving.

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

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

  2. Potato + tomatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,798 recipes

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

  3. Potato + porktop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  4. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  5. Onion + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Clams
Provide the main seafood flavor and body of the chowder.
Potatoes
Add starch that thickens the broth and gives the chowder substance.
Salt pork
Renders fat that carries flavor and browns the base of the chowder.
Tomatoes
Add acidity and liquid that balance the rich seafood and fat.
Oysters
Add briny seafood flavor and tender texture when added near the end.
Butter and flour
Browned flour mixed with butter thickens the chowder and adds a toasty aroma.

The step that matters

Adding the oysters. Oysters toughen and shrink if simmered too long, so they should go in near the end and cook only briefly until their edges curl.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (clam, potato, tomato, oyster, pepper, sauce, pork):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against clam, potato, tomato, oyster, pepper, sauce, pork. 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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