Recipe

I made this soup last night from melskitchencafe.com It's Chicken corn chowder. Try it... it's very good. I made a few modifications (in red text below) to my tastes but you can make the original or do what I did.

INGREDIENTS:

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

2 stalks of celery, finely chopped

1 red bell pepper, finely chopped

1 medium onion, finely chopped

1 jalapeno, finely chopped, seeds and membrane removed (this is important for flavor – but doesn’t add heat because the seeds and membranes are removed and it is cooked with the other veggies) Not a fan of jalapeno's so I didn't include it.

1/4 cup thinly sliced or cooked chopped ham

3 cloves garlic, minced

2 (14-oz.) cans chicken broth

3 tablespoons flour

3 ears of fresh corn kernels or 1 1/2 cups frozen corn kernels (I used frozen)

2 large chicken breasts, cooked and shredded (I just put 2 chicken breasts in the crock pot for a few hours and shredded it)

4 oz. softened cream cheese (Again not a fan of cream cheese so I left this out)

1 cup milk

1/2 teaspoon salt (I added another 1/2 tsp salt as I thought it needed more, so 1 tsp total)

1/4 teaspoon pepper

1 cup shredded cheddar cheese (I left this out as well but Chris sprinkled his on top)

2 small potatoes diced - I think chowder should always have potatoes in it so I diced some up in smaller chunks and added it after putting in the broth and milk and let it cook for about 20 minutes then added the chicken and corn.

Can you tell I don't care much for cheese?

DIRECTIONS: Place olive oil in a large pot over medium heat. Saute celery, bell pepper, onion and jalapeno until tender, about 5 minutes. Stir in the garlic and ham; cook for another 3 minutes. Whisk the broth with the flour in a liquid measuring cup or bowl and then stir into the soup. Add diced potatoes, cook for 20 min. Stir in the corn and chicken. Bring to a low boil and reduce heat. Whisk together the cream cheese and milk in a large bowl until smooth (I had a difficult time getting my cream cheese to completely whisk into the milk so my soup had some minor small lumps but next time, I’ll soften the cream cheese until almost melted in the microwave). Whisk the cream cheese/milk mixture into the soup along with the salt, pepper and cheddar cheese. Simmer on low until ready to serve.

The soup freezes well too. I froze the leftovers last night and had some for lunch today. Yummy

Oh and here is a cute girl.