47. New England Clam Chowder

I had a request to make clam chowder. I had just bought the Cooking Light Soup book and found a recipe that looked easy and quick. There are just a few ingredients and it looked like it would only take about a half hour to make. I was looking for something different to serve with the soup and found a recipe for Broccoli-Cheese Corn Bread. The recipe follows the soup recipe.

New England Clam Chowder

2 (6.5 oz) cans minced clams, un-drained
Cooking spray
1 cup chopped onion
2 turkey-bacon slices, chopped
1 garlic clove, minced
3 cups chopped peeled red potatoes
(about 11/4 pounds)
½ teaspoon dried thyme
2 (8 oz) bottles clam juice
3 tablespoons all purpose flour
2 ½ cups 2% low fat milk
Freshly ground black pepper
Fresh thyme sprigs for garnish (optional)

1. Drain clams, reserving liquid, set aside. Heat a Dutch oven over medium heat. Coat pan with cooking spray. Add onion, bacon slices, and garlic; sauté 5 minutes. Add reserved claim liquid, potato, thyme, and clam juice; bring mixture to a boil. Cover, reduce heat, and simmer 20 minutes or until potato is tender.
2. Place 2 cups potato mixture, including bacon, in a blender and process until smooth. Add potato puree to potato mixture in Dutch oven, stir well. Combine flour and milk, stirring with a wire whisk until blended, add to chowder. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly 10 minutes or until thickened. Stir in clams. Ladle soup into individual bowls, and sprinkle with pepper and thyme. Yield: 6 ½ cups (serving size 1 cup)


Changes and shortcuts:

I chopped the onion, garlic and bacon the night before. The recipe calls for turkey bacon, but I just recently saw something on TV about regular bacon actually being healthier for you so I figured why not go whole hog and I used the real thing.

Results:

Although the recipe says to cook the bacon, onion and garlic together I would suggest starting the bacon and adding the onion and garlic after the bacon has cooked for a little while. It took a long time for the bacon to get done and the onion became browned. My soup never did get thick and it came out more of a brown color rather than the thick, creamy white soup associated with New England Clam Chowder. Since this was a recipe from Cooking Light I’m sure it’s healthier than the traditional chowder. None of us was thrilled with this soup and I will be trying another recipe in the next few weeks.

Keeper? No