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Clam Soup

A soup made with salt pork, onions, clams, water, milk, flour, butter, pepper, sea salt, and Worcestershire sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Clam Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the soup base

  1. Fry the salt pork in a pot until light brown.

  2. Add the chopped onions and cook for about 10 minutes.

  3. Pour in the water and add the clams.

Thicken and finish

  1. Mix the flour with a little water, then add it to the milk.

  2. Pour the milk mixture into the soup and let it boil for about 5 minutes.

  3. Season with butter, pepper, coarse sea salt, and Worcestershire sauce to taste.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Pork + clamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together305 recipes

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

  3. Pork + oniontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,214 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

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 through the soup and browns the pot base.
Clams
Provide the main seafood flavor and savory brininess to the broth.
Flour
Thickens the milk mixture so the soup becomes creamy and body-rich.
Milk
Adds creaminess and mild sweetness, softening the broth's saltiness.
Onion
Builds sweet, savory aroma as it cooks softly in the rendered fat.

The step that matters

Pour the milk mixture into the soup and let it boil for about 5 minutes. Flour thickens only when heated enough to swell its starch, but milk can scorch or curdle at high heat. Stir the flour slurry in smoothly before adding it, and keep the boil gentle so the soup thickens evenly without sticking.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, clam, flour, milk, butter, pepper, sauce):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, clam, flour, milk, butter, pepper, sauce. 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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