Chowders come in several varieties—corn, fish, and clam—are probably the best-known. The New England version of these chowders starts uses milk, as I have mentioned. A New York style of clam chowder omits milk and adds vegetables.
Without corn, fish or clams, your chowder is simply a potato soup. That is what I’ll explain today. This potato soup is good for a Saturday lunch or a vacation meal. It is simple to prepare and does not require many ingredients or much equipment. One does not need to measure carefully, but to provide a sense of proportions that work, I measured my ingredients today.
- 2 slices bacon
- 1 small onion (about 100 g.) chopped
- 3 potatoes (about 400 g.) cut into chunks
- 3 ½ cups basic soup stock* (825 ml.)
- 3 ¼ ounces of dried skim milk (90 g.)
Cut up the bacon into small pieces (about ½ inch.) If you don’t have a good sharp knife available, you can skip this step and wait until the bacon is crisp, then break it into pieces. The crisp bacon is going to be used as garnish on top of the soup.
Cook the bacon slowly in the pan in which you will make the chowder. This will leave bacon fat in the pan ready to flavor the chowder. After the bacon is crisp, remove it.
Bring the soup to a boil and cook it until the potatoes are soft. Test for done-ness by piercing a piece of potato with a fork.
Remove the soup from the heat. Use a whisk, fork or spoon to stir in the milk powder. Return the pan to the heat and re-heat the soup to serving temperature. Your chowder is complete.
Ladle into bowls and garnish with the bacon pieces.
Crackers are a traditional accompaniment to chowders. Hard crackers like oyster crackers, pilot crackers or milk crackers work well. I like to break crackers into my soup and let them soak up the liquid.
Happy Cooking,
Ruth Ann
Note: * I make basic soup (Blog of 01/05/2013) at my convenience and keep some on hand in my freezer. If you do not have basic soup, you can substitute your favorite bullion or purchased stock. You could enhance the flavor by adding some chopped celery along with the onion, and putting in a bay leaf while the potatoes are cooking.