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Corn Chowder

A hearty soup of salt pork, corn, potatoes, onions, milk, and crackers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 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 ↓

Corn Chowder

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Slice the salt pork and onion.

  2. Fry them together.

Make the chowder

  1. Add the water and parboiled potatoes.

  2. Add the corn and enough additional water to cover.

  3. Simmer until the potatoes are done.

  4. Add the boiling hot milk, butter, pepper, and salt to taste.

  5. Add the soda crackers split in halves.

  6. Serve immediately.

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. Corn + potatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together938 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

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

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

Salt pork
Adds savory fat and flavor to the broth as it renders and fries with the onion.
Potatoes
Soften during simmering and thicken the chowder while adding body.
Milk
Makes the broth creamy and rich, adding body and mild sweetness.
Corn
Adds sweetness and texture to the chowder.
Soda crackers
Add body and help thicken the chowder as they soften.

The step that matters

Add the boiling hot milk. Adding very hot milk to the chowder helps keep it hot and blends smoothly. Cold milk can cool the pot and affect texture, so it should be added gently and kept from boiling hard once combined.

Swap the onion

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, corn, milk, butter, 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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