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Fish Chowder

A hearty soup made with fish, potatoes, onions, and pilot biscuits, simmered with water, milk, and seasonings.

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

Fish Chowder

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the larding pork into slices and fry until brown in a deep kettle.

  2. Remove the pork and keep it hot for serving.

  3. Peel and slice the potatoes and onions.

Build and cook the chowder

  1. Layer the potatoes and onions alternately with the fish pieces in the kettle.

  2. Sprinkle salt, pepper, and a little flour over each layer.

  3. Pour in enough boiling water to cover all the ingredients.

  4. Cover the kettle and boil for 45 minutes.

Finish and serve

  1. Soak the pilot biscuits in cold water for a few minutes.

  2. Place the soaked biscuits over the chowder, add the milk, cover, and bring to a boil once before serving.

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. Onion + biscuittop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together428 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

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

  5. Flour + biscuittop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together889 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

Larding pork
Renders fat as it browns, adding savory flavor to the chowder base.
Potatoes
Soften during boiling and help thicken the chowder while adding body.
Fish
Flakes into the broth as it cooks, providing the chowder's main protein and texture.
Flour
Lightly thickens the cooking liquid as it is sprinkled between layers.
Pilot biscuits
Soak up cooking liquid, thickening the chowder and adding body.
Milk
Adds richness and creaminess to the finished chowder.

The step that matters

Adding the milk after the biscuits. Milk boiled hard can scorch on the kettle bottom and curdle or separate. Bringing it to a boil only once, with the biscuits already settled over the chowder, keeps it smooth and reduces sticking.

Swap the onion

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, potato, fish, pepper, flour, biscuit, milk. 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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