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Haddock Chowder

A soup of haddock, potatoes, salt pork, onions, butter, milk, and cracker crumbs, simmered and served hot.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and potato 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 ↓

Haddock Chowder

Ingredients

Directions

Make the chowder

  1. Fry the salt pork until brown in a saucepan with the sliced onion.

  2. Add the haddock cut into small pieces and the sliced potatoes.

  3. Pour in the water and simmer for 30 minutes.

  4. Stir in the butter, milk, salt, and pepper to taste.

Serve

  1. Top with cracker crumbs and serve very 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. Onion + potatotop 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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Milk + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Haddock
Provides the main flaky fish body of the chowder.
Potatoes
Release starch as they simmer, thickening the broth and giving body.
Salt pork
Renders fat that carries flavour through the frying of the onion.
Milk
Adds richness and creaminess to the simmered broth.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth, rounded mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Simmer the haddock and potatoes gently. Fish is delicate and breaks apart under a hard boil, while potatoes need enough simmering time to soften fully. Keeping the liquid at a gentle simmer protects the fish texture and cooks the potatoes evenly.

Swap the onion

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, butter, haddock, milk, potato, 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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