Fresh Corn Chowder with Barbecue Shrimp.
I’m not a super creative person.
I believe that I swung on a few branches of the creativity tree but then lost my balance, bumped my head, and fell managing to miss every branch on the way down. My parents probably figured this out when I demanded on being Jem for the 6th Halloween in a row, but whatever… I liked sparkly pink wigs.
And you might not believe me, but it’s true.
I’d love to tell you that many of my culinary creations are the result of some seriously innovative brainstorming, buuuut…. they aren’t. They are often a consequence of determining what I haven’t made yet, what ingredients I can throw together that won’t bore me to tears, what I can make to avoid something too vegetabley and what isn’t utterly disgusting when combined. Because sometimes sour cream, mango and bacon just isn’t a good idea.
And there are other things too.
I lack all fashion sense. For real. I love clothes and you surely know my stance on shoes, but I can’t put something trendily cute together to save my soul. Just give me black.
I’m terribly bad at decorating too. I blame it on my annoyingly naive expensive taste, but I just don’t know what looks good together. Any time I attempt creative decor, our home looks like it is an art project completed by the preschool down the street.
And! We all know I don’t do crafts. No.freaking.way.
The only time I ever feel that stroke of genius is when I dip a spoon in a jar of peanut butter and smother it with chocolate chips.
So when I’m lacking ideas for dinner I’ll usually ask my mom for suggestions. She only makes a few of the same meals over and over again but she has quite an arsenal of recipes. Not only are her cupboards and drawers nearly busting open with boxes and bags filled with aloha cakes and steak marinades, but she is a serial newspaper clipper. After spending a portion of her morning reading the obituaries [fascinating… I hope I don’t inherit this trait from Mother Lovett] and doing the jumble, she cuts out all sorts of delicious looking things to add to her endless stacks that I totally steal. Which, thank goodness I do steal… or else my dad would be forced to take the bridge and you’d only see her, my brothers and me on Hoarders.
When she mentioned this corn chowder a few weeks ago, I stubbornly decided that it just didn’t sound good to me and there was nooo way I was making it. I brushed it off like the incredibly gross thousand-leg creeper centipede that I found CRAWLING UP MY LEG YESTERDAY (I know!!) and banned it to the I-will-never-ever-make-you-pile while eyeing up a sangria ingredients list. Priorities people.
But then the weirdest thing happened. I started craving this corn chowder. This dumb corn chowder that I had never even heard of and had no desire to make. It was all I could think about and kept me up until the wee hours of the morning this past weekend (well, maybe the Kardashians had something to do with that – are they ever not on TV?) and caused me to drink a giant coffee milkshake for breakfast the next day so I wouldn’t have to hold my eyes open with toothpicks.
Why are moms always right?
Fresh Corn Chowder with Bacon + Barbecue Shrimp
Ingredients
- 4 slices of bacon
- 1 small onion, diced
- 1/2 red pepper, diced
- 2 cloves of garlic, minced
- 2 teaspoons flour
- 1 cup of diced potatoes, 2 yukon gold potatoes worked
- 4 cups of fresh corn cut off the cob, this took 7 medium cobs for me
- 2 cups of chicken stock
- 2 1/2 cups milk
- 1/4 cup cream or half and half
- 1/2 pound of raw peeled and deveined shrimp
- 1/3 cup barbecue sauce
- salt & pepper
Instructions
- Heat a large pot over medium heat. Once hot, add the bacon slices and cook until crispy and golden brown. Remove bacon and let drain on a paper towel. Add onions and peppers to the pot with a sprinkle of salt and pepper and cook for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add garlic and cook for an additional minute. Whisk in the flour, cooking for 1-2 minutes or until flour becomes golden in color and smells a bit nutty. Add chicken stock, potatoes, and corn. Bring to a boil then reduce to a simmer and cook for 10-15 minutes.
- While soup is simmering (or before or after or whenever is convenient for you), heat your grill on the highest setting. Season shrimp with salt and pepper, brush with a thin layer or barbecue sauce, then cook for 2-3 minutes per side. Remove from grill and toss with remaining barbecue sauce.
- Once soup has slightly thickened and the potatoes have started to break down, stir in milk and cream. Add 1/4 teaspoon of pepper, then season according to your tastes. Serve in bowls topped with the crumbled bacon and shrimp. Store leftovers in the fridge for up to one week.
Notes
Did you make this recipe?
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I appreciate you so much!
For my next bowl, I’m just going to use the ladle as my spoon. This was irresistible. [/donotprint]
141 Comments on “Fresh Corn Chowder with Barbecue Shrimp.”
i have been reading your blog for months and everything looks so amazing, you really do a great job photographing it all!
Thanks so much Alexis!
I really like corn. And I really like bbq sauce. So I’m going to say I’d love this. But probably don’t have the motivation to make it anytime soon. How bout you just send me a bowl?
Wish you were my neighbor.
Wow. I’m usually anti-corn chowder, but these pictures may have just changed my mind. Thanks for the awesome recipe!
my husband would love me forever if i made this. well i hope he already does. but he would doubly so.
and OMG CENTIPEDES ARE LIKE MY BIGGEST FEAR and now i have the heebie jeebies about one crawling on me! i don’t know how you didn’t throw up. (unless perhaps you did?) i didn’t even know they were that bold…but i’m not surprised…because i’m pretty sure they have evil minds and could be of the devil.
So I was getting super hungry when I started seeing reading your post and seeing pictures of this yummy chowder, and then I saw the comment about the CENTIPEDE and nearly lost it! I seriously have a centipede phobia. Too many years of finding them in my shower during the middle of washing my hair, gross.
Luckily, my appetite came pack once I moved on from that paragraph and saw more pictures of this delicious looking chowder. Yum.
The middle of washing your hair?!?! WHAT?!? I would freak out. They weren’t IN your hair were they?!
haha thankfully NOT! They just always had the habit of showing their ugly faces after I already started to take a shower and I would see them crawling around the shower wall. Horrible memories. Yuck.
Nightmares.
Love hearing about your Mom and laughting, Makes me love my Mom and feel more normal about how my crazy, wonderful cook, borderline hoarder mother is too. Love the chowder, love adding the shrimp to corn and bacon…. yum, yum, yum!
Mmmmm I LOVE chowder, but haven’t had it forever!! I haven’t even had corn in a long time….why is this?! LOL, corn is like “THE” summer time fav!!
Great recipe girl!
xxoo
just discovered your blog and you are a girl after my own heart. I have “good” ideas when it comes to crafts then I try and put them together and it looks like my 3 yr old did it on a drinking binge.
We would be best friends! Without any cool crafts that is.
Moms ARE always right. Don’t you love it? This looks amazing.., summer corn is the best.
This soup looks so hearty and delicious. I adore anything with fresh corn!! Yum!
wow this looks so incredible! and i happen to have bacon and corn on hand so dinner here i come :)
Love all of your culinary creations. This one sounds and looks delicious. Great pictures.
Oh my, you are killing me! That looks amazing!
I just went and bought the half of the things I was missing to make this for dinner. Minus the Shrimp though. I’m not seafood brave. I am so excited!!
let me know how it turns out!
It’s fabulous!!!
Another addition to the seafood arsenal…thanks!
Literally was just talking about trying to figure out a way to convince my husband to be rio for halloween, so I could be jem… again.
So many of my favorite recipes come from my mom. I love this one! :) (And hate the task of finding Halloween costumes. Why do adult dress up parties exist? I thought we were supposed to be over it!)
shrimp and bacon!? i love this.
Corn chowder is my favorite thing in the world, no lie. But, shrimp?! I don’t think I can. And, funny you should mention Aloha Cake, because I just bought a bottle of coconut extract and saw a recipe for it on the back. Now I must make it!
WOW that looks great! I can’t wait to make this on a cool fall day :)
ummm i’m drooling over here!
The barbeque sauce is such an interesting addition. I seriously need to start newspaper recipe clipping. My mom gave me the New York Times cookbook… a bunch of their recipes from over the years… and their are some awesome ones!
i need this right now. i have a really bad cold and this is all i want. if i wish for it at 11:11 do you think it’ll show up at my dinner table?
That chowder looks delicious!! How do you always come up with such different (and unique) recipes? And thank you for posting so many of them, my boyfriend and I both think they are pretty tasty!
That looks extremely yummy! I’ve only cooked with shrimp once and it turned out okay, but really seafood-y. My family makes shrimp all the time and it tastes great, not fishy. I wish I had inherited their kitchen skills.
Oh, I also am fascinated by obituaries and the daily jumble. They’re the only couple of things I care about in the newspaper :)
Thought you might like this :)
http://www.jammychicken.com/2011/08/bacon-vodka.html
and this recipe looks insanneellyyy flavoursome, comfort grub right there!
It is 7:35 am here. And now I’m thinking: can I eat fresh corn chowder with bbq shrimp for breakfast?
This is now a ‘must-save’ recipe! You have a way of making everything look and sound like I must make it right.this.second.
You had me at bacon… and shrimp…. the reference to corn chowder and Hoarders took me to new heights of ecstasy.
HOLY FREAKING YUMMILICIOUS!!
House Centipedes. Worst. Things. EVER!!
Chowder looks awesome, I’m totally going to try to make it!
HEELarious.
Next time just put a diving board next to the pot, dive in and practice your butterfly stroke. Of course, eating your way out of the pot. Duh.
Holy Wow, I love everything about this. And you’re so full of shit- you are VERY CREATIVE (that was a compliment, lol!) Can’t wait to hang out w/ you in Napa!
I’m your standard lurker, I almost never comment on anything. But I saw this recipe last night and bought potatoes, corn, and a red pepper at the farmer’s market last night. It’s on the menu tonight and I’m sharing it with my own mom (and dad) who I’m sure will love it.
Thanks for sharing, and thanks for the Bella pictures, I need my golden puppy fixes!
Keep me posted Laura! :)
It was fantastic! Nice and silky without being too heavy, the potato added a nice creaminess, while the corn gave it just a bit of crunch. Just enough left for lunch tomorrow, and all 3 of us really enjoyed it. And I’m thinking I can enjoy it this winter with frozen corn. Thanks for the recipe. :)
Oh my! This looks crazy good.
This looks amazing! I’m allergic to shrimp, so I’d have to omit that, but I think it would work out just fine! As for decorating, shoes or fashion…you and I are twins!
I kind of think my boyfriend is going to be in love with this when I make it for him. Thank you in advance!
Wow, you have outdone yourself with this recipe! I love corn chowder and have a master recipe but I will be trying this one! Thanks for sharing :)
Oh hell, that looks amazing!
Mmmm, I think this is my next dinner party soup! Looks comforting.
I made your corn chowder Friday night and it was a hit! Looking forward to more soup recipes…
Chili would be good :)
dinner tonight for first day back to school. been raining hard all day long! popovers in the oven and this simmering on the stove. winning. thanks!
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I’ve been thinking about this recipe ever since you posted it and am about to make it this afternoon. Thinking about seasoning it with chipotle seasoning instead of just black pepper. Thoughts?
Cooked this today!!! SUPER YUMMY!!! I added cayenne pepper bc I LIKE IT HOT!
Fantastic recipe!
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omg i had to comment on this recipe. i made this tonight and we capital LOVED IT!! so delicious. and i will admit, after making the buffalo chicken soup a couple weeks ago i thought it would be hard to beat but this one makes it a tie between the two. both incredible! keep the soups coming, we’re big on them in this house :) maybe a tomato one?? or black bean….?
Wait, did you say coffee MILKSHAKE?? Recipe please!
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I made this tonight and it is fabulous! The whole family loved it.