[PhatTBoll]

Good to hear the Angeline agreed with you. It's one of the best bargains I've found this year.

To the OP:

When you are eating smoked food, the flavors tend to override some of the more delicate chardonnays and pinot noirs. Therefore, you might want to try a moderately oaky version of one of these wines. I generally dislike oak, but you want something that's going to stand up to the smoked flavor, and the interaction between the smoked salmon and the oaky wine could surprise you.

For the chowder, the classic choice is going to be either a Sancerre or Pouilly-Fume, both of which are made from sauvignon blanc. These are very dry wines which are fairly acidic, so they can cut through the strong shellfish flavor very nicely. If you decide to try either of these, make sure you get the help of one of the employees at the store, because the quality of these can be pretty uneven. New Zealand sauvignon blanc will also work well here, and you will probably have a little more margin of error.

Champagne was mentioned by another poster and that sounds like it would work also.

Gewurztraminer isn't a bad choice either, but the American versions can be pretty spicy. I like this, but a lot of people don't. You might be better off grabbing an Alsatian gewurz, which is going to be a little more rounded and subtle than its CA or WA counterparts.