chowder

1. A thick soup containing fish or shellfish, especially clams, and vegetables, such as potatoes and onions, in a milk or tomato base.
2. A soup similar to this seafood dish: corn chowder.

[French chaudière, stew pot, from Old French, from Late Latin caldāria. See cauldron.]

Thick soup made from shellfish (especially clams) or other fish, with pork or bacon. Originally French, now mainly New England and Newfoundland. The name derives from the French chaudière, the large cauldron in which it is prepared.

A thick, chunky seafood soup, of which clam chowder is the most well known. The name comes from the French chaudière, a caldron in which fishermen made their stews fresh from the sea. New England-style chowder is made with milk or cream, Manhattan-style with tomatoes. Chowder can contain any of several varieties of seafood and vegetables. The term is also used to describe any thick, rich soup containing chunks of food (for instance, corn chowder).

It begins with the cooking pot, called in French a chaudière. Perhaps New Englanders got it from trade or military expeditions to French Canadian outposts up north like Louisbourg (see Covered Wagon 1745). The idea is to toss in whatever you have on hand, particularly seafood, salt pork, vegetables, and often crackers and milk, to make a thick hot stew or soup.

In 1751 we find that chowder is already the subject of poetry. On September 2 of that year, rhymed "Directions for making a chouder" appeared in the Boston Evening Post: "First lay some Onions to keep the Pork from burning, Because in Chouder there can be no turning."

A century later, the great New England orator and statesman Daniel Webster (1782-1852) had his own recipe for chowder. According to a 1931 cookbook, it supposedly went like this: "Take a cod of ten pounds, well cleaned, leaving on the skin. Cut into pieces one and a half pounds thick, preserving the head whole. Take one and a half pounds of clear, fat, salt pork, cut in thin slices. Do the same with twelve potatoes. Take the largest pot you have. Try out the pork first; then take out the pieces of pork, leaving in the drippings. Add to that three parts of water, a layer of fish, so as to cover the bottom of the pot; next a layer of potatoes, then two tablespoons of salt, 1 teaspoon of pepper, then the pork, another layer of fish, and the remainder of the potatoes."

Fill with water to cover the ingredients and boil for twenty-five minutes. Then add a quart of boiling milk and ten hard crackers, split and dipped in cold water. After five more minutes of boiling, "the chowder is then ready and will be first rate if you have followed the directions."

This article is about the soup variety. For the television series, see Chowder (TV series).

This article does not cite any references or sources. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (July 2008)

New England clam chowder

Potato and corn chowder

Chowder is any of a variety of soups, enriched with salt pork fatback and thickened with flour and some sort of seafood, or more traditionally with crushed ship biscuit or saltine crackers, and milk. To some Americans, it means clam chowder, made with cream or milk in most places, or with tomato as "Manhattan clam chowder." Corn chowder is a thick soup filled with whole corn (maize) kernels.

The most accepted etymology for the word chowder comes from the cooking pot in which it is cooked, known in French as an chaudière, from Latin caldaria (akin to English cauldron). The word "chowder" is a New England word that came from Newfoundland, where Breton fishermen — who would throw portions of the day's catch and other available foods into a large pot — introduced the word, and perhaps the fish soup itself (compare bouillabaisse). Another possible origin for the word chowder is derived from the Old English "jowter", which means fishmonger (one who peddles fish).

Fish chowder, along with corn and clam chowder, continues to enjoy popularity in New England and Atlantic Canada. Seafood chowder is a traditional and popular dish in Ireland. Sometimes the freshest clam chowder can have a gritty consistency due to small particles of sand still present in the clams at the time of preparation.

Types of chowder

• Clam chowder
• Corn chowder
• Southern Illinois chowder

References

• Wentworth, Harold and Stuart Berg Flexner, 1967, Dictionary of American Slang, Thomas Y. Crowell, NY. ISBN 0-690-23602-6 ("Chowderhead" definition, in use since c. 1835).

• Robert's Guide To Eating Chowder

• Edwards County Historical Historical Society, Albion, Illinois, A History of Edwards County, Illinois Volume One 1980

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Chowder

• Mussel Chowder Recipe
• 5 Recipes for Chowder
• [1]

See also

• Cioppino, a fish stew derived from Italian cuisine
• Jeongol, a chowder-like stew in Korean cuisine

This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)

Dansk (Danish)
n. - fiskesuppe

Nederlands (Dutch)
soort vissoep

Français (French)
n. - soupe épaisse de palourdes

Deutsch (German)
n. - m. Mischgericht aus Fisch, Muscheln, Fleisch, Kartoffeln u. Gemüse

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - (μαγειρ.) κακκαβιά, ψαρόσουπα

Italiano (Italian)
zuppa di pesce

Português (Portuguese)
n. - tipo de sopa (f) (Culin.)

Русский (Russian)
густая похлебка

Español (Spanish)
n. - sopa de pescado, estofado de viandas variadas

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - chowder (sorts soppa)

中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
杂脍

中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 雜膾

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 잡탕의 일종

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - チャウダー

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) حسا من سمك و بطاطا و بصل‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮מרק סמיך, מרק דגים, מרק תירס, תפוחי אדמה ובצל‬

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