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Cape Cod Chowder

A hearty fish chowder made with sweet salt pork, potatoes, onions, pepper, butter crackers, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

Cape Cod Chowder

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Fry the slices of sweet salt pork until crisp.

  2. Pour off some of the fat and set the pork aside to keep warm.

Layer and cook

  1. Layer potatoes, onion, and pepper in a kettle.

  2. Add a layer of butter crackers and fish, then a little more fat.

  3. Repeat the layers until the kettle is two-thirds full.

  4. Top with any remaining fat and fill with water.

  5. Cover and cook for 1 to 1.5 hours, depending on quantity.

  6. Add salt to taste before serving.

Serve

  1. Serve with the pork arranged around the dish on toast and pickles.

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. Pork + potatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  3. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

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

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

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

Sweet salt pork
Renders fat that flavours the chowder and yields crisp pork for garnish.
Potatoes
Starch that softens during cooking and thickens the broth slightly.
Butter crackers
Absorb liquid and fat, softening into the chowder and adding body.
Fish
Provides the main protein and savoury flavour of the chowder.
Onion
Adds aromatic sweetness and depth as it softens in the broth.

The step that matters

Covering and cooking the layers. Cooking covered at a gentle level lets potatoes and fish cook through without the fish breaking apart or the broth scorching on the bottom of the kettle.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, potato, pepper, butter, fish):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, potato, pepper, butter, fish. 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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