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Clah and Fish Chowder

A soup of clams, fish, potatoes, onions, butter, and milk served with ketchup and crackers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 ↓

Clah and Fish Chowder

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. In a skillet, melt the butter over medium heat and sauté the chopped onion until soft.

  2. In a large pot, bring the cold water and salt to a boil.

  3. Add the sautéed onion and butter to the boiling water.

Cook the chowder

  1. Add the clams to the pot and boil for 10 minutes.

  2. Stir in the potatoes and boil for another 10 minutes, or until the potatoes are cooked.

  3. Pour in the reserved clam liquid and bring to a boil.

  4. Add the milk and serve immediately with tomato ketchup and browned crackers.

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 + tomatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,798 recipes

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

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  4. Onion + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

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

  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

Clams
Provide the main seafood flavor and tender bite that define the chowder.
Potatoes
Add starch that thickens the broth slightly and gives the chowder body.
Milk
Adds creaminess and mild sweetness to the broth.
Butter
Carries the onion flavor and adds richness to the broth.
Onion
Adds savory aroma and sweetness as it softens in butter.

The step that matters

Adding the milk. Milk can curdle or scorch if it boils hard for long. Adding it near the end and heating gently keeps the chowder smooth and creamy.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, butter, clam, potato, milk, ketchup):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Chivefits about as well
  3. Tomatothe original
  4. Shallotfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, butter, clam, potato, milk, ketchup. 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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