A Food Adventure

It's time for a recipe!

Over the winter my good friend shared a new food blog with me entitled Food Wishes (see link in Blogs I Love). It so happened that the post for that day was for a creole crab and corn chowder. I had just started getting into seafood over the past year or so and Howie had been trying to convince me to like crab for some time by having me try it every chance he got (note: if you don't already know, I used to be the pickiest eater on the planet growing up, hence why I'm just expanding my diet now). This site is primarily a video blog of the chef narrating the preparation of the meal. So I watched the video for this chowder and thought, hmm, that looks interesting. I printed out the ingredients list for safe keeping. About 2 weeks ago Howie bought lump crab meat from Costco to bring to my parents for a dip he wanted to make while we watched Master's. Sadly, we left the crab at home. I knew I had this recipe in my back pocket, but was truthfully nervous about making this chowder. It's completely out of my realm of comfortable food styles and I was still questioning how much I really actually like crab. When the weather turned back to cold and rainy, with it came my itch for soup. It was time, and it was very successful!

Creole Crab and Corn Chowder
Courtesy of Food Wishes with Chef John
Ingredients:
2 tbsp butter
1/2 cup diced onion
1/2 cup diced pepper (bell, jalapeno, or any you like)
1/2 cup diced celery
Salt and pepper to taste
1/4 tsp cayenne
1/2 tsp old bay
1 1/2 tbsp flour
3 1/2 cups water or stock, divided 2 1/2 cup, 1 cup
1 lb sweet corn, divided in halves
2 cloves garlic peeled
8 oz fresh crab meat, divided 2 oz, 6 oz
1/4 cup heavy cream
1 tsp sweet spanish paprika
green onion to garnish (optional)

Please see the video from the original link if you want to make this for the best directions from the chef, but here is a brief description of the instructions:

In a medium pot on medium heat: melt butter, add onions, peppers, celery and a healthy sprinkle of salt. Sweat for 5-ish minutes until the veggies are tender to your liking (note: total cook time will about an hour, so don't over cook them at the beginning). Add old bay and cayenne seasoning, mix.

Add flour to make a roux, add 2 1/2 cups of the chicken stock slowly while stirring the roux continuously. Add half of the corn and 2 oz of the crab. Increase heat to bring to a simmer. In a blender, blend the other half of the corn, the last 1 cup of chicken stock and the 3 cloves of garlic. Add to the simmering pot and lower head to med-low and continue simmering. Let this simmer for 35 minutes.

After 35 minutes, add the cream, paprika and the rest of the crab. Mix it all together and let it cook for 5 more minutes to warm through the crab and cream.

My notes: I ended up only using jalapenos with the seeds removed (I had a green bell on the side in case I got nervous about the kick from the jalapenos). I used low sodium chicken stock. I used 3 small-medium sized cloves of garlic. I ended up adding A LOT of salt and pepper at the end... so make sure you taste test to see if you have enough before serving... corn needs a lot of salt and pepper. I didn't garnish with green onion, but I did add a small sprinkle of nutmeg at the end. Had I known what to expect with the flavors I would have served it with a french baguette on the side for dipping... next time!

Serve and ENJOY!! This was a delicious adventure and I will definitely be adding this to my repertoire!