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Corn Chowder

A hearty soup made with salt pork, onions, potatoes, corn, milk, and thickened with corn starch.

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 ↓

Corn Chowder

Ingredients

Directions

Build the base

  1. Cook the fat salt pork in a pan until browned.

  2. Add the sliced onion and cook until browned.

  3. Add the sliced potatoes and enough water to cover them, then cook until the potatoes are tender.

Finish the chowder

  1. Stir in the can of corn and the milk.

  2. Season to taste and thicken with corn starch.

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 + corntop 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. Pork + corntop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,069 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Potato + milktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

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

What each ingredient does

Fat salt pork
Browned fat builds savory flavor and seasons the broth as it renders.
Onion
Softens and browns, adding sweetness and aroma to the base.
Potatoes
Soften in the liquid, adding body and some starch to the chowder.
Corn
Adds natural sweetness and texture to the chowder.
Milk
Adds creaminess and richness to the broth.
Corn starch
Swells in hot liquid to thicken the chowder.

The step that matters

Thickening with corn starch. Corn starch thickens only when heated in liquid, and it clumps if added dry. Mixing it with a little cold liquid first and then stirring it in while the chowder simmers lets the starch granules swell evenly into a smooth thickened base.

Swap the onion

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

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

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