Every body knows what Chowder is.

For those who do not know; Chowder is a type of rich thick, chunky traditional seafood soup, of which clam chowder is the most famous and well known.

Chowder can have any of different varieties of vegetables and seafood. The name chowder also is used to describe the rich and thick soup.

If you want to know what a Clam chowder really is, you most try it. You will love it!

The traditional chowder in the USA is more often made with clams. The most popular are the New England clam chowder style.

This soup “clam chowder “is considered the most famous seafood soup of the world. And is a specialty of the states of New England in USA.

Chowder a term first used in N. America in the 1730s.

The word chowder is derived from French Chaudière, a 3- legged heavy iron pot sitting above glowing coals and bubbling with a thick seafood soup.

The dish may have found its way via French Canada to New England, where the seafood became almost exclusively clams.

Hungry colonists watched wild pigs rooting in the shore sands for clams, and they soon realized the value of those meaty clams for making their first clam chowder. A rivalry now exists between New England purists, who want their chowder made with milk but no tomatoes, and those farther south, who want their chowder made with tomatoes and water, hence a thinner brew. The latter became Manhattan or Long Island chowder, in which there is another distinction a pronounced flavor of thyme. The bits of thyme are left floating on the surface and do not detract from the soup’s eye appeal. New Englanders place their thyme in a muslin bag, which is discarded before serving.

Chowder always means a hearty soup, usually but not invariable of seafood; and clam chowder is its best- known form. Indeed, one should say forms in the plural, for New England, which along with the Maritime Provinces of Canada has for long been the main home territory of chowders; there are lively arguments about what is an authentic clam chowder. Mariani (1994) describes this thus in his excellent long essay about chowder:

By the end of the century certain New England regions became known for their various regions interpretations of chowder one might find cream in one spot, lobster in others, no potatoes elsewhere but most were by then a creamy white soup brimming with chopped fish or clams, crackers, and butter. In Rhode Island, however, cooks often added tomatoes to their chowder, a practice that brought down unremitting scorn from chowder fanciers in Massachusetts and Maine, who associated such a concoction with New York because the dish came to be called, for no discernible reason, “Manhattan clam chowder” sometime in the in the 1930s. By 1940 Eleanor Early in her New England Sampler descried this “terrible pink mixture (with tomatoes in it, and herbs) called Manhattan Clam Chowder, that is only a vegetable soup, and not be confused with New England Clam Chowder, nor spoken of in the same breath”.

Clam stock should never be weak of lifeless in flavor. This means using enough clams to produce a strong clam broth or else reducing the broth to concentrate its flavor. Canned or bottled clam broth or juice is a weak substitute for broth made with fresh clams but it can be strengthened by boiling down.

Potatoes are always used and the preference is for diced salt pork rather than bacon.

Hard – shell clams called quahogs are the ones used in chowder. Soft – shell clams or steamers are eaten in other ways.

Clams may be opened with a clam/ oyster knife, but for the tyro it may be less trying to use the following method: Arrange them on a rack or an inverted pie tin resting on the bottom of a pot with a tight – fitting lid. Add a cup or so of water and drop in the clams. Cover. Boil over medium heat until the clams open. Shake the pot once or twice during the steaming. Live clams from pot with slotted spoon or tongs and let them cool slightly before pushing out the meat with the thumb.

In preparing all clam chowders, clams should be scrubbed and well rinsed to remove grit and other particles. Nevertheless the clam juice still may be sandy, so strain through a double or triple thickness of muslin or cheesecloth. Discard sediment left in the bottom of the pot after the liquid has drained off.

Clams, even in their raw state, are somewhat chewy. Overcooked, they become almost inedible, so take care when preparing clams not to overcook.

The strict discipline over what went into chowder was finally broken when cooks turned back to an earlier version _ a fisherman’s stew of the catch of the day.

The came chowders from inland – corn, cheese, tomato, and on and on . Chowder today encompasses anything made with three common ingredients: salt pork pieces fried to crisp bits, onions cooked in the fat and potato cubes. These are the foundation for almost all chowders, seafood or vegetable.

A collection of both sea- and land – based chowders follows.

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