Chunky Fish Chowder

A quick and easy one-pot meal for a midweek supper and lip-smackingly good, if I do say so myself. We ate two helpings.

My fish stock, by the way, was made from prawn shells which is why the finished chowder turned pinkish rather than a creamy beige.  The prawn flavour added another dimension but any good fish stock will do.

New potatoes don’t really work for this as they don’t break down at the pureeing stage to make a creamy soup. Baking/mashing potatoes are best: I used Maris Piper.

Chunky Fish Chowder

Image of bowls of chowder

Ingredients:

450g potatoes, peeled and cut into 1.5 cm dice

2 leeks (about 200g trimmed weight), sliced into rings

250g firm white fish (I used sustainably fished cod but you could try haddock, pollock or gurnard)

250g undyed smoked haddock

350 ml milk

600 ml fish stock

Teacup of frozen peas, defrosted

160g tin of sweetcorn, drained

Big handful chopped parsley

Salt and pepper and a squeeze of lemon juice

Method:

Skin and bone the fish and cut into 4-5cm chunks.

Image of leeks and potatoes cooking in fish stock

In a deep pan, cook the leeks and potatoes in the fish stock until just tender.

Remove around half of the vegetables, along with some of the stock, and whizz in a blender or food processor until smooth but not gluey.

Put the puree back in the pan with the remaining leeks and potatoes and stock and stir to blend, but try not to break up the remaining potato chunks. Add the milk and heat through. Grind in a little black pepper.

At a gentle simmer, add the fish, sweetcorn, peas and parsley and cook gently for three or four minutes until the fish is just cooked and the veg are heated through. Check the seasoning and add salt if necessary (it depends on the saltiness of your smoked fish and fish stock).

Squeeze in a little lemon juice to lift the flavours then serve in deep bowls  garnished with a few sprigs of parsley.

Image of a bowl of chowder

8 thoughts on “Chunky Fish Chowder

  1. Oooh, I would love a bowl of that. Other Half, however, has a funny thing about chowder being a soup and therefore ‘not a proper main meal’. Loon…

  2. Fish chowder–may fave! I love a good one even more than clam chowder. Peas are a new wrinkle for me, although they make sense this time of year. By the way, skate is great in this too–and the cartilaginous frame keeps the flesh from falling apart. Thanks. Ken

    • Good tip, Ken, thanks. I know the peas aren’t strictly koshe, so to speak, but I like the colour and I was trying to get as many veg in as possible!

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