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Clam Chowder

A hearty soup made with salt pork, potatoes, onions, clams, tomatoes, and biscuits.

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 ↓

Clam Chowder

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Render the salt pork in a frying pan until browned.

  2. In a large pot, combine the pork, potatoes, onions, and water.

  3. Boil the mixture for 45 minutes.

Finish the chowder

  1. Add the chopped clams with their juice and the tomatoes.

  2. Season with pepper, salt, and mace.

  3. Boil the mixture for 15 minutes.

  4. Stir in the broken biscuits.

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

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

  3. Pork + potatotop 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 + biscuittop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together428 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Salt pork
Renders fat that carries flavor and browns the base for savory depth.
Potatoes
Starch that softens during boiling and thickens the chowder body.
Onions
Adds aromatic sweetness and savory flavor as they soften in the broth.
Clams
Provide the main seafood flavor, and their juice adds briny depth to the broth.
Tomatoes
Add acidity and body that balance the richness of the pork and clams.
Broken biscuits
Absorb liquid and swell, further thickening the chowder and adding body.

The step that matters

Stir in the broken biscuits. Biscuits thicken quickly as their starch absorbs liquid, so adding them too early or in large lumps can make the chowder pasty or unevenly thick. Stir them in gradually while the liquid is simmering so they disperse evenly.

Swap the mace

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, potato, onion, clam, tomato, pepper, biscuit. 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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