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Potato Chowder

A creamy potato chowder with bacon or ham, onions, parsley, butter, flour, water, and milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Potato Chowder

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Peel and dice the potatoes.

  2. Chop the onion finely.

  3. Cut the bacon or ham into small pieces and cook in a frying pan with the onion until light brown.

Layer and simmer

  1. In a saucepan, layer half of the potatoes, then sprinkle with the ham, onion, parsley, salt, and pepper.

  2. Add the remaining potatoes and repeat the layering with the ham and onion.

  3. Pour in the water, cover, and cook on low heat for 20 minutes.

  4. Stir in the milk.

Thicken and serve

  1. Mix the butter and flour together, then stir into the boiling chowder.

  2. Cook for 1 minute, taste for seasoning, and serve hot.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  3. Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  5. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Form the body of the chowder and thicken it as they break down while simmering.
Bacon or ham
Adds savory, smoky flavor and fat that carries flavor through the chowder.
Milk
Adds creaminess and richness to the broth.
Butter and flour
Together form a roux that thickens the chowder when stirred into the hot liquid.

The step that matters

Stirring the butter and flour into the boiling chowder. Flour added directly to liquid clumps, so mixing it with butter first and stirring it in while the chowder boils lets it disperse and thicken evenly. Cooking briefly afterward removes the raw flour taste.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, butter, ham, parsley, milk, flour, pepper):

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, butter, ham, parsley, milk, flour, 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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