Eric Jorgensen’s Hearty Fish Chowder

One of the very cool things about Facebook is finding old friends you haven’t spoken with in ages. This recipe comes to me from an old high school friend I recently found on Facebook.

When we first met in homeroom on our first day of high school, we discovered we were born just days apart in the same hospital and both had mothers from Denmark. Small world. Eric went off to sea his senior year but we keep in touch by letters and years later he visited me in New York City. And then we lost touch until our Facebook connection.

Eric is a stay-at-home dad like myself and takes on a lot of the cooking so I asked him to send me one of his favorite recipes. This fish chowder is one he used to make when he was working on commercial fishing boats. He has worked on crab boats and salmon boats in Alaska, fished lobster in Maine and on trawlers in New Zealand so I guess he should know something about fish chowder.

Fish Chowder

This recipe creates a hearty stock in which to poach fish. The amounts of liquid can be altered to create either a fish stew or chowder. Likewise, the vegetable amounts can be varied based on what you have on hand, the object is a flavorful stock.

Ingredients:

• 2 onions
• 3 carrots
• 3 medium sized potatoes
• 3 stalks celery with leaves
• ½ lb bacon
• 1½ lbs fresh chopped clams
• 2 - 3 lb fresh fish, white fleshed like cod or haddock
• 3 tablespoons flour
• Fresh thyme (optional)
• Salt and pepper, to taste
• Cream or half & half (optional for New England style)

How to Make Fish Chowder at Home

Finely mince the onions, 2 carrots, 1 potato, 2 stalks celery. Chop remaining veggies into bite-sized chunks to add later.

In large pot, saute bacon, add minced veggies, & stir until cooked. Sprinkle in flour and stir a few minutes longer. Add some salt and pepper. If you don’t want to use bacon, substitute butter.

Add water to pot to cover veggies with a few inches of water, more for a soup, less for stew. You can always adjust.

Let veggies simmer for an hour or two to make a nice stock that will be used to make the chowder. I asked Eric if you should strain the vegetables when done simmering now that they have done their job and added their flavor to the stock but he told me “they just kind of disappear and create a thick stock, especially with the addition of flour.”

About an hour and half before serving, add remaining chopped veggies and clams. Let them simmer for approximately 1 hour 20 minutes. Check seasoning, this recipe can take a lot of fresh pepper and salt. Add fresh thyme if desired. If a thicker chowder is desired add some more flour-premixed with water to a slurry to avoid clumping. When potatoes and carrots are almost tender, add fish.

Allow fish to cook just below a boil, until tender, about 10 minutes. Don’t overcook fish, just until it can flake. Fish can be left in large pieces and served on rice, or broken up for a traditional fish stew.

If you want a New England Chowder add cream when fish is done—but do not allow to boil once added.

Eric also likes to add shrimp to this dish with the fish.

Eric told me, “I used to make this on fishing boats, making the stock when I had a chance and adding the fish when it was time to eat. I like clams now for flavor and consistency and they’re really quite economical at around $6 for fresh chopped, but any fish heads and bodies work to create a stock. Now, I prefer butter to bacon, and skip the cream, you can really taste the fish much better.”

Serve as a chowder with good bread, or ladle onto rice for a heartier meal.

A Simple Lobster Bisque for Valentine’s Day

Ok guys, how’s this for a great fish course? Lobster Bisque. A bisque is a cream soup that uses the shells of crustaceans (shellfish like shrimp & lobster) and is often pureed. What’s not to love? Sweet, succulent lobster, creamy base, and easy, too (but you don’t have to tell her that).

There are recipes out there that call for setting things on fire (flambé), chopping up whole lobsters, and that have ingredient lists as long as your arm. That’s all well and good, but what we’re aiming for here is maximum impact with a minimum of frazzled nerves, so you can both enjoy your romantic Valentine’s Day dinner and not smell like you just crawled out of the sea.

Easy but Elegant Lobster Bisque

Ingredients:

• 1 - 2 cups cooked lobster meat (you can now find lobster meat frozen or canned in most supermarkets, otherwise buy one and cook it yourself)
• ½ cup dry sherry or dry white wine
• 3 tablespoons butter
• 3 tablespoons flour
• ½ cup onion, diced
• ¼ cup celery, diced
• ¼ cup carrot, diced
• Salt and white pepper, to taste
• ½ teaspoon Old Bay Seasoning, or to taste
• 2 tablespoons tomato paste
• 1 cups whole milk
• 1 cup half and half
• 1 cup chicken stock (if you have lobster stock, use that instead)

How to Make Lobster Bisque at Home

Combine the lobster meat with the sherry. Cover and refrigerate.

In a hot pan over medium heat, melt the butter. Once it stops sputtering, add the onion, celery, carrot, salt and pepper and Old Bay. Stir and let cook until the vegetables are translucent and are getting soft.

Add the tomato paste and cook for another couple of minutes.

Add the flour and cook for two to three minutes, stirring all the time.

While whisking, add the cold milk, half and half and stock and bring to a boil. Let boil for about 1 minute, still whisking constantly. Turn the heat down and let simmer until slightly reduced.

Now, you have two options.

Option 1: using an immersion blender, blend the soup until smooth.

Option 2: Strain the soup through a fine mesh strainer, pressing down on the solids.

Taste, and add more salt, pepper or Old Bay, if you think it needs it. Add the reserved lobster and sherry to the pot and simmer for just a couple of minutes, so the lobster is heated through.

Serve with crusty bread and maybe a little sour cream on the top. If you want to be really fancy, sprinkle on a little chopped tarragon as garnish.

Alternative Direction

If you don’t want to make your own lobster bisque, you can look for a quality commercial brand at your local supermarket or gourmet store. Many of them now have there own signature label and are making some decent soups. I buy fresh soup from Genuardi’s supermarket once in a while and it is good but not as good if you make it yourself.

You can also buy find some good lobster bisque online. These are commercial companies that sell lobsters but also sell bisques and chowders. Of course they do, what are they suppose to do with all those shell? You will end up paying a lot in shipping and because lobster bisque is really easy to make at home, I encourage you to give the recipe above a try.

LobsterGram.com - sells whole lobsters as well as their own lobster bisque

Linton’s Seafood

Another alternative is homemade but with the help of a commercial product. There is a good lobster stock reduction called Glace de Fruits de Mer that you can read about at GatewayGourmet.com - lobster stock. They have a recipe for Lobster Bisque using this Glace de Fruits de Mer that is sort of homemade but not entirely.

Serving Instructions

There’s going to be a lot of food served on this special night and lobster bisque is rich and creamy so go easy. A small cup should be plenty. Think of it as a tasting menu. A lot of small servings. Go the extra mile and buy some fresh chives to chop up and use as a garnish. Home cooks just don’t use enough garnish with their cooking. It is simple enough to do but really improves the presentation. I might suggest a dollop of creme fraiche, but this soup should be rich enough.

Next, we’ll look at salads. Don’t forget to check out my Squidoo lens called A Romantic Valentine’s Day Dinner. It’s full of interesting information about Valentine’s Day and pulls all these blog posts together with additional recipes, videos, movie suggestions and a lot more.

Image from Linton’s Seafood

Classic Lobster Bisque

Romantic Cheese Course

Lobster Bisque Recipe

How to Make A Great Salad For Valentine’s Day

Pork Medallions with Apricot Glaze Recipe

Steak with Wild Mushroom Sauce

Fish en Papillote or Fish in Parchment Paper

Chocolate Souffle

Chocolate Dipped Strawberries

My Squidoo - A Reluctant Valentine’s Day Dinner

Clean Out the Fridge: Making Turkey Soup From Leftovers

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Thanksgiving is almost here so let’s continue thinking about what to do with all those leftovers. You’re most likely finding a lot of information about how to cook a turkey and what to serve with it in your favorite cooking magazines and local newspapers, but let’s talk about what to do with all those leftovers. We already looked at preparing Leftover Thanksgiving Day Turkey Chili so now let’s look at Leftover Thanksgiving Day Soup.

There are two dilemmas that home cooks have around the holidays. One is making room in the refrigerator for the holiday feast. Dilemma two is getting rid of the leftovers after the holiday feast. Fortunately, there is one solution to both of these problems: soup.

If you don’t have any stock lying around before the holidays, make sure you have some good quality chicken or turkey stock from the store. The simplest soup is literally:

Open your refrigerator -
Take out the leftovers -
Dump them in a pot -
Cover them with stock -
Heat -
Serve

Ok, so maybe you need a little more direction than that? Let’s go see what’s leftover in my fridge. Okay, here’s what I have:

• Half a jar of salsa
• 2 limes
• Some leftover roasted chicken
• 2 jalapeno peppers
• Wonton skins
• Carrots
• Celery
• Peeled cippolini onions
• Bacon
• Sliced lunch meat - roast beef and ham
• Potato scraps in water leftover from squaring a potato for dicing

What’s in the pantry that I can use?

• Dried cranberry beans
• Mini fusilli pasta
• Hot sauce

Sounds like soup to me. I’m thinking some sort of a spin on Tortilla soup.
Here’s what I’ll do.

How to Make at Home

1) Quarter the onions. Cut the wonton skins in strips; brush with a little oil, sprinkle with salt and brown/crisp in the oven. (If you have a Fry Daddy, go for the deep fry)

2) Slice celery and carrots on the bias, then cut jalapenos into small dice.

3) Cook the bacon and crumble into small pieces.

4) Cut up lunch meat into little pieces.

5) Dice potato scraps.

6) Heat a pan big enough to hold all this stuff, put in some olive oil and let the oil get hot. Add the carrots, celery, jalapenos and onion and season with salt and pepper.
Add some chili powder and the salsa and then some chicken broth.

7) Put beans in and bring to a simmer. Simmer until the beans get soft. This can take at least 2 hours but you can skip the beans if you don’t have much time or use canned beans if you have them. Add the juice from the limes.

Add the chicken, lunch meats and potatoes after the beans are soft. If you are using canned beans, add the meats and potatoes with the beans and let everything simmer for about 20 minutes.

9) Add a handful of past but not to much or it will soak up all the stock. Continue simmering until the pasta is done to your liking, about 10 minutes.

10) Serve in bowls with crumbled bacon and crispy wonton strips on top

Is this a “real” recipe? Well, probably not, but it is real cooking. It’s finding a use for what I have and putting those ingredients together in an appetizing way. Plus, my fridge is now ready for my turkey and big old ham!

Post-Thanksgiving Soup

The clean-out-the-fridge-after-Thanksgiving soup is even easier. You can make Turkey Chili, or you can stick with soup. If your fridge looks like my fridge after the holidays, there will be:

Turkey - Ham - Peas - Mashed potatoes - Carrots - Roasted sweet potatoes
Stuffing - Green beans - Cranberry sauce

First and foremost, you’ll want to make some stock out of the turkey carcass - that will free up a lot of space. Make a minimalist stock - by just covering it with cold water, adding some salt and peppercorns and letting it simmer for a few hours while you do other things. Once you’ve got your stock, the rest is easy.

• Dice leftover meat
• Mix some stock with the mashed potatoes and some stuffing - this is what will thicken your soup and give it a cream soup texture.
• Add all your leftovers to the pot. They’re already cooked, so you’ll just want them to heat through.
• Taste for seasoning and adjust as necessary.
• Best practice is to chill the soup overnight and then reheat so the flavors will marry, but you can just go ahead and eat it.

If you’d like to do a little more cooking to make your leftover soup, try this.

Heat your soup pot and add some oil.
Throw in about a cup or so of stuffing and stir it around until the stuffing starts to brown a little -I make mine with celery and onions, so, instant aromatics!

Add some stock and about a cup of mashed potatoes. Stir everything around a little more.
Add the rest of the stock and your other leftovers.

Add any herbs or spice blends that you want (poultry seasoning is nice for a turkey soup). Don’t be afraid to add the cranberry sauce (maybe 1/2 cup or so) - I think you’ll like it.

The sweet-tartness will help to balance all the other rich ingredients.
Taste it for seasonings and adjust as necessary. Chill overnight and reheat for best flavor.

Related Thanksgiving Posts on Reluctant Gourmet

Let’s Talk Turkey

Thanksgiving Turkey Dinner Tips

Turkey Basics

Turkey Gravy for Thanksgiving or Anytime

Turkey Gravy in a Hurry

Leftover Thanksgiving Day Turkey Chili Recipe

Deer Valley Chili

Fresh Orange Cranberry Sauce

Roast Turkey Soup with Winter Vegetables

How to Roast the Perfect Thanksgiving Turkey

Turkey Cartoon