Chicken, lentil & sweetcorn chowder
How’s the weather over at your end? Here it is cold and miserable at the moment. There is still snow but it is melting and instead we get rain. I think I prefer the snow to be honest.. 🙂 (did I tell you already that the Dutch are notorious for their complaining about the weather?? It’s never good, too cold, too warm, too hot plus we like to talk about… a lot… Ofcourse I am not a typical Dutch person.. 🙂 ) I was supposed to have an appointment in the studio but the lady just cancelled. Is it weird if I go “YEAH” after she cancelled? It would – ofcourse – potentially be a new customer, so I should be said and crying in the corner of my office. Not so much…
Because the weather is soooooo cold and miserable a nice hot soup for lunch is always very comforting. I was going through the new issue of Good Food and saw this lovely chowder. Now if you ask me when something is a chowder and when something is just a regular soup; I have no idea. So I looked it up in Wikipedia and according to the description; Chowder is any of a variety of soups (duh…), enriched with salt pork fatback and thickened with flour or more traditionally with crushed ship biscuit or saltine crackers, and milk. To some Americans, it means clam chowder, made with cream or milk in most places, or with tomato.
The word chowder comes from the cooking pot in which is it cooked, known in French as Chaudiere, from Latin caldaria (akin to English cauldron).
So I kind of feel like Harry Potter now, stirring my chowder in a cauldron.. 🙂
This is a very light variety and the taste is fabulous. It’s relatively quick although it does need a little bit of cooking time, but it’s worth the wait! Perfect for a cold winterday! (this is ofcourse to make up for posting a cucumber soup in the middle of winter, although technically the other part of the world has winter so there is always something for someone.)
Chicken, sweetcorn and lentil chowder
Ingredients
- 4 spring onions trimmed and thinly sliced
- 850 ml chicken stock
- 250 gr potatoes diced
- 300 ml skimmed milk
- 250 gr boneless skinless chickenbreast, cut into small pieces
- 140 gr frozen or canned sweetcorn
- 410 gr Puy lentils or green lentils rinsed and drained
- chopped chives to serve (optional)
- 1. Place the spring onions in a large pan with 6 tbsp of stock and seasoning. Cover and cook for 2-3 minutes until softened. Add the potatoes, the rest of the stock and the milk. Bring to the boil an simmer gently, partially covered, for 10 mins or until the potatoes are just tender. Ladle out about a quarter of the mixture into a blender and whizz until smooth. Stir back into the pan.
- 2. Add the chicken, sweetcorn and lentils to the pan and cook for 5-7 minutes more or until the chicken is cooked. Check the seasoning and serve in warm bowls, scattered with chopped chives (if using).
- Obviously this is very easy to make into a vegetarian meal. I loved the little bits of chicken in the soup but it would be just as tasty without or maybe with some other veggies added in there. I would say great base soup for lots of different 'chowders' (always make me think of a baby shower...)
Disclaimer
The nutritional values above are calculated per portion. The details are based on standard nutritional tables and do not constitute a professional nutritional advice.
