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Oyster Chowder

A stew of oysters, potatoes, salt pork, butter, tomato catsup, and oyster liquor.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and tomato match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,798 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Oyster Chowder

Ingredients

Directions

Layer the kettle

  1. Layer thin slices of salt pork in the bottom of a kettle.

  2. Add a layer of thin sliced potatoes, then a layer of oysters.

  3. Season each layer with coarse sea salt and black pepper, and add some butter.

  4. Pour ½ cup of tomato catsup over each layer.

Stew

  1. Pour the oyster liquor over the entire mixture.

  2. Cover tightly and let stew slowly for 30 minutes.

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 + tomatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,798 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. Pepper + tomatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Pork + tomatotop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,843 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 into the broth, adding savory richness to the chowder.
Potatoes
Starch that softens during slow stewing and thickens the chowder slightly.
Oysters
Provide the main seafood flavor, which firms and curls as they cook.
Butter
Adds fat that carries flavor and gives the broth a smooth, rounded mouthfeel.
Tomato catsup
Adds sweetness and acidity that balance the salty pork and briny oysters.

The step that matters

Cover tightly and let stew slowly for 30 minutes. Gentle, covered simmering keeps the oysters tender and prevents them from toughening and shrinking, while the potatoes cook through. Boiling hard can make oysters rubbery.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Capsicumfits about as well
  2. Onionfits about as well
  3. Asparagusfits about as well
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, potato, oyster, 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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