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Fish Chowder

A hearty fish chowder made with haddock, salt pork, crackers, onion, pepper, water, flour, and catsup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Pork and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,214 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Fish Chowder

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Fry slices of salt pork in a pot until crisp.

  2. Remove the pork and chop finely, leaving the fat in the pot.

Layer and simmer

  1. Layer fish, split crackers, chopped pork, and chopped onion seasoned with pepper in the pot.

  2. Repeat layers until all ingredients are used.

  3. Cover with water.

  4. Simmer for 30 minutes.

Thicken and serve

  1. Transfer to a serving dish.

  2. Thicken the gravy with flour.

  3. Add a little catsup.

  4. Boil briefly.

  5. Pour over the chowder.

  6. Serve.

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

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

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

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

  3. Pork + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,121 recipes

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

  4. Haddock + flourtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together401 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Onion + flourtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together32,460 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Haddock
Forms the main body of the chowder, cooking into flaky pieces.
Salt pork
Its rendered fat seasons the pot and adds savory depth to the chowder.
Split crackers
Soften in the liquid and help thicken the chowder.
Flour
Thickens the gravy so it coats the fish and crackers.
Chopped onion
Adds aromatic sweetness and savory flavor to the layers.

The step that matters

Simmer for 30 minutes. Simmering gently keeps the fish in tender pieces, while a rolling boil can break it apart and toughen it. Keep the liquid at a low simmer throughout.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (haddock, pork, pepper, flour):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against haddock, pork, pepper, flour. 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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