Corn Chowder

[chappie]

I entering a friend's chowder cookoff for the second straight year this weekend. Last year I spent a fortune on a lobster, andouille, mussels and saffron chowder that was unbelievably good -- but due to some poor planning and slow crock pot, too cold upon tasting there to win.

This time I'm going for a corn chowder with crawfish (a restaurant owner friend has a bunch in his freezer he's willing to part with). I'm thinking of cooking several bags of sweet corn first, then running it through a food mill to make a thick base to add to the chowder. I'm also going to boil down some corn cobs, from which I've cut the kernels -- I'll carmelize them

Other ideas are poblano chiles, red pepper for color and some canned chipotle. Mom has some lobster stock she made this week, so I might add that -- and of course I'm going to reduce some good cream to add at the end.

Any other ideas?

[Bond Girl]

You could try making an indian version of it with ginger and cumin and garam marsala.

[paul mitchell]

How about cold smoking the crawfish? Chantrelle mushrooms never hurt either.

Edited February 16, 2005 by paul mitchell (log)

[chappie]

How about cold smoking the crawfish? Chantrelle mushrooms never hurt either.

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My only problem with that is that the tails are precooked. The mushrooms may work, but I don't want to distract from the flavor of the corn or poblanos. A friend makes a similar chowder with andoille, but I'm not looking for that sharp of a meat flavor, either. I'm going to render some salt pork to start, and there will be potatoes... because I don't think chowder is chowder unless it has a pork product of some type and potatoes.

[Dana]

I had a corn chowder recently at a restaurant that contained chipotle, and it was just delish. Will you have any sort of croutons? I've made some I sauteed in bacon fat, and they were really nice on a soup.

[NulloModo]

Oh yes, definately add some bacon to the chowder, bacon and crawfish are perfect together. Perhaps something for a little texture as well? I'm thinking peanuts added late in the cooking just so they soften up a little might be great.

[stovetop]

A smoked pork hock

use fresh corn

take the meat out of shells and roast the bones, make like a shrimp or crab bisque

or use clam nector, or a nice light halibut stock

use a slurry to thicken( flour -water)

sweet peppers, cellery (very little)

potatoes, carrots, onions

Cream at the end

top with some corn and crawfish

steve

[fauxtarga]

I'm also going to boil down some corn cobs, from which I've cut the kernels -- I'll carmelize them

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This is interesting - you are boiling down blank cobs (no kernels)? What does this do, do you use it as a base to reduce? Is it like making corn stock? Or am I just misreading this and you are just using the kernels. Good luck.

[Luckylies]

bacon.

pork fat.

[suzilightning]

[This time I'm going for a corn chowder with crawfish (a restaurant owner friend has a bunch in his freezer he's willing to part with). I'm thinking of cooking several bags of sweet corn first, then running it through a food mill to make a thick base to add to the chowder. I'm also going to boil down some corn cobs, from which I've cut the kernels -- I'll carmelize them

try poaching your corn cobs in milk or evaporated milk then use that when you cook your potatoes. start trying the salt pork then add onions or shallots, leeks and then red pepper. then your milk and potatoes and the corn. finish off with the mudbugs and chives or flat leaf parsley as garnish.

[chappie]

Well, my "Cornographic Crawfish Chowder" won the contest hands down! Tasting one of the runner-ups, I had wondered if I should've used some andouille, but people seemed split on whether they liked sausage in their soup or not...

Here's what I did:

Made stock with 6 roasted, dekerneled cobbs, a quart of frozen lobster stock Dad had, celery, bay leaf, carrots, garlic and onion.

Rendered salt pork, added some butter and cooked down one onion, two cloves garlic, four red bell peppers and five poblanos, finely diced. Seasoned with pepper, two chopped chipotles in adobo (plus some of the sauce), cumin, Old Bay and a secret ingredient: an unlabeled, unidentified, granulated dried shrimp + spice product Dad picked up last month in Vietnam...

Then in went five diced potatoes, the roasted corn I'd cut off the cobbs, and stock. When potatoes were tender I added cream (started with 2 and half quarts and reduced slowly -- don't know what I ended up with...). Cooked four bags of frozen sweet corn, pureed them in the food processor in batches, pushed through a sieve for an intense corn background/thickener. Then at the very end I added 3 pounds of crawfish tails. Seasoned to taste (I added some splashes of Tabasco chipotle sauce, more of the secret Vietnamese shrimp stuff, and a thinned-out tablespoon of dried mustard...)

There were about 80 tasters, 15 or so chowders. Most crockpots were scraped dry, but there was one next to mine -- a crab chowder that smelled good -- that was still over half full by the end of the night. It tasted like soymilk powder mixed with crumbled chalk, margarine and the outflow of a chain-smoking crustacean with dysentary.

The runner-ups were a Rhode Island chowder that contained sausage and a very pure, clean rockfish (striped bass) chowder.

Next time, if I were to try to replicate my effort in a pinch, without simmering stock forever, I'd try using a bunch of shrimp paste in the corn stock, and acquiring a food mill to save steps on the corn essence.

[chappie]

It's that time of year again, the annual chowder cookoff weeks away and a title to reclaim after a subpar showing last year when I lost to some blonde whose oysterish paste contained bits of shell. Maybe she paid off the judges in the back room.

This year I'm thinking of making an insanely rich and delicious base, then grilling my seafood outside on the deck just before tasting. How does this sound?

I have also been tempted to do a quadruple corn, non-seafood chowder, but I think the voting public expects something that recently swam or lurked on the bottom of a body of water.

Any ideas for an award winner? I want to hone this recipe in my mind before taking it any further...

[Shel_B]

This weekend or next I'd like to make Toots some corn chowder. After looking through my recipes, I discovered I have but three for this dish, and none of them really push my buttons except one from America's Test Kitchen which, coincidentally, is a lighter version of the dish. I may make that one, but before doing so I was hoping to get some more ideas for a light version of corn chowder.

Since the ATK recipe may be under some copywrite laws, I won't post it here, but I'm certainly willing to send it to anyone who'd like to take a look at it. Thanks!

[Dave the Cook]

Not really chowder, but I can vouch for the corn and leek soup here: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128339700

You could easily turn it into a chowder with some diced potato, and I don't think it would affect the experience in a bad way. Maybe add a little more seasoning.

(Full disclosure: Janet and I are domestic partners.)

[DocDougherty]

First the haiku version:

Summer sweet corn - blend;

a little chicken broth - add;

salt, heat, serve - yum yum!

And then the recipe:

1 pound of cooked and cut corn (or a package of cooked frozen baby corn)

Place in VitaMix blender and add broth until it comes up about 80% of the way to the top of the corn

Add 1/2t salt (up to 1t depending on your taste)

Blend on high for 5 min

Temperature should be about 180°F when finished (just from the blender energy dissipated in the soup).

You will swear that there is a ton of cream in it (I use this instead of bechamel to make a gluten-free, dairy-free souffle)

If you want some meat, float a bit of pulled pork or sous vide chicken breast on top, or some cheese.

If you want it to add some color, garnish with pickeled red bell pepper and some diced jalapeno, and perhaps some cilantro.

But you don't need any of that.

[janeer]

Here you go, from me: a classic corn chowder and a grilled one. Also, this one.

[Mjx]

Any of the ideas here work for you? http://forums.egullet.org/topic/62075-corn-chowder-for-cookoff/?hl=%2Bcorn+%2Bchowder

[Shel_B]

Any of the ideas here work for you? http://forums.egullet.org/topic/62075-corn-chowder-for-cookoff/?hl=%2Bcorn+%2Bchowder

Some interesting ideas, but not what I want. I'm looking for simple, flavorful corn chowder that's rich with fresh corn flavor, somewhat creamy, but nonetheless, light. None of the ideas posted in this thread do it for me either, even though there are some good ideas.

Based on what I've seen thus far, both here and on various web sites, the ATK recipe, and a somewhat similar one that I've had for a while, are the closest to what I want. The ATK recipe uses more water, no chicken stock, very little cream or dairy, and promises lots of fresh corn flavor, and that's based on my own experience with one of their techniques in another recipe. And while it uses some bacon, I can reduce the amount to maintain that "lighter" result I'm looking for. Thanks to all who've jumped in with their ideas.

[Heartsurgeon]

something to experiment with - highly recommended

make your chowder using grilled corn on the cob (strip the husks off, and put the unadorned corn directly on the grill until it is well toasted (speckled char all over).

cut the corn off the cob, and make corn stock out of the cobs!

corn cob stock is amazing.

use some in your corn chowder recipe of choice.

many possibilities for corn stock. it is tremendously sweet and flavorful.

[Shel_B]

make your chowder using grilled corn on the cob (strip the husks off, and put the unadorned corn directly on the grill until it is well toasted (speckled char all over).

cut the corn off the cob, and make corn stock out of the cobs!

corn cob stock is amazing.

Neither Toots nor I are particularly fond of charred and grilled corn in chowder, soups, and salads, although we do enjoy eating it on the cob. What I want is the taste of fresh, minimally processed, corn in the chowder. For our preferences, milking the cobs after the kernels have been removed is a better, or at least more interesting, option. I would scrape any remaining pulp on cobs into a bowl and then transfer the pulp to a clean kitchen towel which I'd wrap tightly around the pulp, and then squeeze out the juice from the pulp which would be added back into the chowder towards the end of the cooking time, enhancing the fresh corn taste. Adding some corn cob stock might also be a good idea. Thanks!

Edited June 28, 2013 by Shel_B (log)

[Jaymes]

After I do some version of pretty-much everything mentioned here depending upon mood and the amount of time/energy I have, especially "milking" the cob with the back of my chef's knife (which I never forget), I cut or break the cobs into thirds, and simmer them a bit in a covered saucepan, in either plain water, or chicken stock, or fat-free skimmed milk. Or, if I'm feeling decadent, whole milk or half-and-half or, sometimes, even cream.

I think that simmering the broken cobs adds a lot of "fresh corn" flavor.

Oh, and because I'm sorta Southern, always flame a bit of bourbon to pour over the finished dish.

Just like my grandma did.

Edited June 28, 2013 by Jaymes (log)

[Bill Klapp]

Silver Queen corn off the cob, a little chicken or seafood stock, a little heavy cream, pinches of salt, white pepper, cayenne pepper and/ or sugar, as you like, and jumbo lump blue crab. The end. Make clam chowder with the potatoes. Second choice, substitute milk for the stock, drop the crabmeat and substitute julienned fresh basil. Despite the dairy, rich but light in both cases. Best not to overthink this one...

Edited June 29, 2013 by Bill Klapp (log)

[djyee100]

Take a look at Alice Waters' recipe for Sweet Corn Soup. It sounds closer to what you're looking for. Here:
http://oursoupbowl.blogspot.com/2010/01/sweet-corn-soup.html

You can play with this to turn it into a chowder. Since this soup is fresh corn and not much else, use very fresh corn that still has some natural sugars that haven't turned to starch--that usually means fresh corn from the farmers market. I also suggest only a medium-size onion (or smaller) so the soup doesn't turn onion-y. The short cooking times for the corn will preserve the natural flavor of fresh corn. The method in this recipe is as important as good ingredients.

have fun with your corn chowder quest...

[Zmaster]

I have made this one in the past and we really enjoyed it. You could easily lighten it up.

http://kitchenconfit.wordpress.com/2008/09/04/jasper-whites-corn-chowder/

[Shel_B]

Take a look at Alice Waters' recipe for Sweet Corn Soup. It sounds closer to what you're looking for. Here:

http://oursoupbowl.blogspot.com/2010/01/sweet-corn-soup.html

Yes, that's much more in line with what I'm seeking. Thanks!