A Winter Soup: Corn Chowder

Corn chowder garnished with Parmesan, freshly cracked black pepper and chopped chives.

Ingredients: 1 stalk of celery, 1 onion, 1/2 to 3/4 a pound of potatoes, 1 clove of garlic, 2 slices of bacon, 1 pound of frozen corn, 4 cups of water, 1/2 cup of milk (or cream), chives for garnish, salt and pepper.

Also, a beer. It doesn\'t go into the soup. It goes into you. It makes cooking better. Trust us.

Mise en place: Mince the onion, mince the garlic, mince the celery and cut the bacon into bite size pieces. Cut the potatoes into 3/4 inch pieces.

Render the bacon in your soup pot until you get some nice color.

Add the onion, celery and garlic. Cook for about 5 minutes.

After five minutes, the onions are transclucent.

Add the potatoes and 4 cups of water. You could use chicken stock for a more complex flavor. (At this point, we realized our soup pot wasn\'t quite bit enough and transferred everything to a larger pot.) Bring the pot to a boil and then reduce to a slow simmer. Let simmer for 15 minutes or until the potatoes are tender.

Add the corn and then let simmer for 5 minutes.

Looking good so far.

Add the 1/2 cup of milk or cream. We used whole milk. Gently heat the soup for about another minute (don\'t let it boil again - you just want to make sure it\'s hot).

We topped our soup with shaved Parmesan, some cracked black pepper and some chopped chives. Enjoy!

A friend used this corn chowder recipe and tweaked it (using chicken stock, some cut up chicken, a dash of paprika, etc.), taking this picture afterward. Thanks, Tania! Flickr des\cription: \"I was in the mood to make a simple dinner, and a friend had posted a corn chowder recipe that already looked great. I doctored the original recipe with a lil\' bit of this and that, then served with a salad of romaine hearts and roasted beets.\"