Skip to main content
Main

Fish Chowder

A hearty soup made with fresh fish, crackers, potatoes, and milk, seasoned with salt, pepper, and optional onion.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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

Layer the pot

  1. Layer some fish in a pot, then add crackers and sliced potatoes, seasoning with salt and pepper.

  2. Repeat the layers with the remaining fish, crackers, and potatoes.

  3. Cover the layers with water and add onion if desired, along with fried pork or butter.

Cook and serve

  1. Boil until the potatoes are tender.

  2. Stir in 1 quart of milk and bring to a boil.

  3. Before serving, remove all large bones from the chowder.

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. Potato + porktop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

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

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

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

  5. Onion + porktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,214 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

Fresh fish
Provides the main protein and flavor of the chowder.
Potatoes
Thicken the broth slightly as they cook and give the chowder body.
Crackers
Soften in the liquid and help thicken the chowder.
Milk
Adds creaminess and richness to the finished broth.
Fried pork or butter
Adds fat, giving the broth richer flavor and mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Remove all large bones before serving. Fish bones do not dissolve during simmering, so they stay in the chowder and can be a choking hazard if not removed before serving.

Swap the onion

The recipe marks onion as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, potato, pepper, pork, milk):

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

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

More fish chowder recipes

New England 5Salt 3 See all 159 →

You might also like

Potato CroquettesPotato Croquettes255 recipesFried FishFried Fish120 recipesPork CakePork Cake107 recipesRoast PorkRoast Pork82 recipes