Corn Chowder

Today we welcome another guest post by Cluedo – find her others here and here

As readers of my last post may have already twigged, I’m not a big fan of domestic goddess style cooking, so the She Quickie Cookbook with its faux feminist agenda is a bit of a red rag to me. Be a career woman AND a fabulous cook, and do it all in 15 mins to make your man happy. Hand me the vomit bowl.

But maybe I should not be so unkind, after all, working married women in the 60s were a bit of a novelty*. On the other hand, taking the mickey out of the cookbook is fun, so I thought I’d do it again. This time, I chose the Corn Chowder (cost: 3/9, calories: about 550 each). I had most of the ingredients, so I didn’t check on the pricing, although 3/9 would be £2.85 in today’s prices – I somehow doubt you could get all the necessary stuff for that money nowadays

Now for the cooking:

The recipe is nice and easy as you can see from the images below. I did actually try and be more organised this time, i.e. put all the stuff that I needed near me rather than what I usually do, which is run around frantically, pulling stuff from the fridge and the pantry like I only just realised now that the onions should go in with the minced meat rather than sitting unchopped at the back of my food box while the mince is nearly done. So I was quietly confident that my timing would be not too far off this time, after it took me more than double the time to make the Tomato Rarebit – bad Cluedo.

But again, no such luck.

Of course, I blame the cookbook: despite their near-anal description of things to collect and plates to warm up before you start, they completely omit that you would need a chopping board and that you need to peel the potato**. Also, I defy anyone but Antony Bourdain on coke to peel and slice an onion, dice 4 rashers and cut up 2 potatoes and 2 tomatoes in 3 minutes, especially if you need to peel the potatoes first. Or did they have pre-peeled potatoes back then? It also doesn’t help that Sainsbury’s fancy bacon comes fanned out in the pack rather than just stacked as it does with their cheap “I-Can’t Believe-This-Has-Pork-In-It”-water bacon. So you lose valuable time stacking them up to dice them in one go. Time is money, honey, especially if you’re working against the She-Quickie-Cookbook-Clock! Also, in which universe do potatoes cook in 10 minutes in not very much water, even when sliced?

Anyway, trying not to be too panicked by the quarter hour deadline, I proceeded apace, and it was all very straight-forward. I did start frying the onions, bacon, potatoes and tomatoes in the frying pan rather than as indicated in the sauce pan, which I always find weird. But that’s probably just me. I transferred the mix over when it was time to put in the sweetcorn & water. The fritters scared me a little bit, as I have a similar success rate with nice-looking fritters as with fried eggs, but surprisingly, they turned out ok. And were very yummy. I altered very little of the recipe – no cooking fat but sunflower oil for the fritters as I was out of Stork and prefer oil over fat anyway. I also used quite a lot more cheese than indicated, but that was because I was trying out lacto-free cheese for the first time and pigged out. Note: lacto-free cheese is bland, but works quite well as glue-cheese required for this dish. I halved the ingredients, and ate the lot alone, when I realised that it’s meant for four – which will go some way to explaining why I felt quite so full afterwards *burp*. But who quarters a tin of corn, and one rasher is never enough, in any circumstance.

It is nice and yummy, so if you’re looking for something quick and easy and comforting, it’s your ticket. It took me 27 minutes to prepare it, which is slightly better than last time. And the potato was still undercooked, albeit edible.

Err, and I do have to apologise for the lack of a picture – I was so hungry by the time I was finished that I simply forgot. Trust me, it looked nice, like the picture in the cookbook, just in colour.

*(not really, women have always worked, but that’s a yarn to be unspun somewhere else at another time…)

**they give you 2 minutes to collect all the stuff together. Hah, I laugh in your face Quickie Cookbook, I live in a house with 7 other people, my tin opener cannot be found that quickly. And cleanly.

Sweet Corn Bread

Ah, sweetcorn. A controversial choice to some regular readers but a very popular one in my house, as those very readers know. This recipe is from Lousene Rousseau Brunner’s New Casserole Treasury (1970, The Cookery Book Club for Harper and Row). A book in which a great deal of care and attention has been paid to the layout of recipes  – a lovely, calm sans-serif font and  recipes arranged so that the pages need never be turned during cooking. Thanks, Ms R-B, you bring order to a troubled universe and your use of booze is epic. (Seriously, one of these days I will make Parisian Chicken and then you will see – but this will necessitate a serious trip to the offy. Until then, you’re stuck reading about ‘Things I have made with things I have found in my fridge’.)

Crispy Corned Tuna

My second from the St Michael All Colour Budget Cookery Book. The fish pie was not so dreadful that I was scared to try another from this tome, so I went for another fishy dish. This recipe is truly budget, and with the addition of the crisps on top is definitely not one to serve to grown-ups. Actually, thinking about it I’m not sure it’s suitable for children either (I think cats might like it though).

Crispy Corned Tuna

Almost all the ingredients for this crispy-topped pie come from the store cupboard, and it takes less than half an hour to prepare and cook.

Beans with Corn and Pumpkin (Porotos Granados)

I bent the rules slightly here by using up some butternut squash in place of pumpkin and as various substitutions for those who cannot lay their hands on cranberry or navy beans are suggested, I feel I’m doing justice to the spirit of the dish.

We are informed that this dish is originally from Chile (Porotos is the Chilean word for beans) although it has ‘decided Indian overtones’ in terms of its ingredients and that the corn/pumpkin combination is also popular in the Basque country and Aquitaine.

Paprika Corn Kernel Fritters

I love  smoked paprika so much I want to quote 30 Rock.

Paprika Corn Kernel Fritters

LEFTOVER:  COOKED CORN KERNELS
about 1 1/2 cups

AND

Flour, 1 cup
Baking powder, 1 teaspoon
Salt 1/2 teaspoon
Paprika, 1 tablespoon
Well-beaten egg, 1
*Milk, 3/4 cup
Finely chopped green pepper, 2 tablespoons
Fat or lard
Lemon quarters, 4 – 5

Sift flour with baking powder, salt, and paprika. Beat egg into milk; blend into flour mixture. Beat with rotary beater until smooth and free of lumps. Add corn and green pepper. Drop by spoonfuls into 1/2 inch hot fat in shallow frying pan. Fry until golden brown. Drain and serve with lemon quarters.

This is a side dish – makes 4 – 5 servings.

*Substitute: Part milk, part corn liquid.

Notes

• I only had 1 cup of sweetcorn so I adjusted the quantities of other ingredients accordingly.

• I made the batter, realised I didn’t have any pepper in the house, ran to shop round the corner which has a carp selection of veg and as they had no green pepper, was forced to buy red.

Conclusion

There seemed to be insufficient batter to bind the fritters, however they fried perfectly which shows what I know.  (Really, my sister is the family fry queen.)  They were a very nice accompaniment to grilled chicken and steamed kale. I ended up making 9 decent sized fritters, which would probably constitute 3 – 4 portions for someone less greedy than me. (I have 5 left… mmmm, breakfast.) Another nom from Potluck Cookery.

Frittered by Elly