Skip to main content
Main

Clams

A creamy clam soup made with milk, butter, and cracker dust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Clams

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Put the hard parts of the clams into a saucepan with the water, tomatoes, onion, red pepper, and salt.

  2. Cook slowly for one hour, then strain through a fine colander.

Finish and serve

  1. Return the strained soup to the fire and add the milk, butter, cracker dust, and soft portions of the clams.

  2. Stir constantly until it boils, then let it boil for one minute.

  3. Add more salt and pepper if necessary, and serve very hot.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  3. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Clam + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together840 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Hard parts of clams
Simmered slowly to release their flavour into the broth.
Tomatoes
Add acidity and body to the broth.
Onion
Adds savoury sweetness and aroma to the base.
New milk
Makes the soup creamy and mellows its salty, briny edge.
Cracker dust
Thickens the soup as its starch absorbs liquid and swells.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Stir constantly until it boils. Milk and starch can scorch on the bottom of the pan and form a skin or curdle if heated unevenly. Constant stirring spreads the heat, keeps the soup smooth, and lets the cracker dust thicken evenly.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Onionthe original
  4. Asparagusfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against clam, tomato, pepper, milk, 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.

More clam soup recipes

Mock 5Philadelphia 3 See all 191 →

You might also like

Tomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesCream of Tomato SoupCream of Tomato Soup107 recipesTomato BisqueTomato Bisque61 recipesCream Tomato SoupCream Tomato Soup28 recipes