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Fish Chowder

A hearty soup of salt pork, potatoes, onion, fish, tomatoes, milk, and sea biscuits.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Haddock and sauce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 200 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Fish Chowder

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Fry the diced salt pork until crisp in a chowder kettle.

  2. Add the halved potatoes and part of the chopped onion to the kettle.

  3. Layer the fish pieces over the potatoes and sprinkle with the remaining onion, seasoning with salt and pepper.

  4. Add enough water to just cover the fish.

  5. Pour in the canned tomatoes, cover, and cook until the potatoes are tender.

Finish and serve

  1. Stir in the milk and heat until scalded.

  2. Season with Sauce Piquant or tomato ketchup, and adjust salt and pepper as needed.

  3. Break sea biscuits into a pan, pour water over them, and keep warm to soften.

  4. Serve the chowder in a tureen and top with the softened sea biscuits.

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. Haddock + saucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together200 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

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

  3. Potato + tomatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,798 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  5. Pepper + tomatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 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
Renders fat that carries savory flavor into the chowder base.
Potatoes
Soften during cooking and thicken the chowder body as their starch releases.
Cod or haddock
Provides the main protein, cooking gently into flakes in the broth.
Canned tomatoes
Add acidity and savory depth that balance the rich milk.
Milk
Adds creaminess and a mild sweetness to the broth.
Sea biscuits
Soften in water and thicken the chowder when floated on top.

The step that matters

Heating the milk until scalded. Milk can curdle or scorch if it boils hard or is added to an overly acidic broth. Heating it gently until just scalded keeps the chowder smooth and creamy.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Onionthe original
  3. Spinachfits about as well
  4. Mustardfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, potato, haddock, pepper, tomato, milk, sauce. 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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