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Onion Chowder

A thick soup made with onions, potatoes, butter, and herbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 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 ↓

Onion Chowder

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Cook the minced onion and butter over low heat for 30 minutes without browning.

  2. Add the boiling water, diced potatoes, salt, and pepper to the pot.

  3. Cook for an additional hour.

  4. Stir in the fine herbs and 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. Onion + potatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

  4. Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

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

  5. Onion + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Onion
Softens and sweetens slowly in butter, forming the flavor base of the chowder.
Potatoes
Break down partly as they cook, thickening the broth and giving the chowder body.
Butter
Adds richness and carries flavor from the onion through the chowder.

The step that matters

Cook the onion gently without browning. Low heat keeps the onion sweet and pale. Browning would add bitter, toasted notes and change the clean flavor this chowder depends on.

Swap the onion

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, pepper, butter. 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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