Justin's Junior Chef Bloggette - Seafood Corn Chowder

Today for dinner we are making a seafood soup that we thought looked good from my Mom's magazine.  We changed some stuff because the recipe used a lot of scallops and she says they are expensive.  We put some white fish and salmon in instead with a few baby scallops and some shrimps.  I thought it turned out really good but Brenden says it is "Just ok."  Whatever.

And I learned that when you cut up onions they make your eyes hurt and water.

What you will need:

1 tbsp olive oil
1 large carrot, chopped
1 onion, chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped
1 tsp. smoked paprika
1/2 tsp. dried thyme
1 lb russet potatoes (2 medium sized baking potatoes), peeled and chopped into chunks
1 can peaches and cream corn
1 can creamed corn
1 cup whole milk (3.25%)
2 cups water or stock
100 g bay scallops
100g shrimp, tails removed
100g salmon, cut into chunks
100g white fish, cut into chunks
2 green onions, white and light green parts, thinly sliced
salt and pepper to taste

Heat oil in a soup-sized pot.  Add onion, carrots and celery, add salt and pepper, and cook until soft but not brown (about 6-8 minutes).  Add smoked paprika and thyme and stir.  Add water and bring to a low boil.  Add potatoes and reduce to a simmer until just cooked, about 7 or 8 minutes.  Remove about 1 to 1.5 cups of potato/celery/carrot and set aside.  Add in can of creamed corn and milk  Using an immersion blender, purée soup until smooth.  Add reserved potato/celeary/carrot mixture and the can of creamed corn, and stir to combine.  Add more salt and pepper if needed.  Cook for 5 minutes until heated through.

Add scallops, shrimp and fish to the chowder and simmer for 3 to 5 minutes until the fish is cooked through.  The shrimp will turn pink and start to curl, and the fish will turn more white and opaque (solid) instead of translucent (almost glowy see-through).  Ladle into bowls, sprinkle with green onions and serve!

Mom's Note:


Firstly, yes I am helping with the typing :-)

Justin is a natural chef.  His interest in trying just about anything constantly blows my mind.  We have fun just hanging together in the kitchen.  And I just love the way he comes out with these mature and sometimes rather profound observations about cooking for a 10 year old.  In addition to trying to teach Justin how to cook, I am also trying to teach him to be cost conscious.  There is no way a young guy would have a pound of scallops in a soup, so I thought he should learn the right way to substitute.  We also picked this recipe because corn was on sale at No Frills this week for $1 for a bag or 2 for $1 for the cans.  They were out of frozen, so I thought the creamed corn would add a great texture to the soup without fat.  And it is cheap!


A neat variation on this for the adults would be to stir in 1 tsp (or more) of thai red or green curry paste and substitute a can of coconut milk for the whole milk, and cilantro instead of thyme.