Woah Nellie!

This community cookbook ‘Clam Chowder’ hits the perfect flavor balance

by Mary Jo David

As Woah Nellie! shifts focus to recipes from old cookbooks and recipes collected by folks in our area, I found myself browsing the “First United Methodist Church of Waterloo Cookbook” that was published in 1988. Thank you to Nancy Wisman for loaning her copy of the cookbook; many of the pages were dog-eared so I can only assume the Wisman family was well fed during that era!

While browsing the cookbook, I came across a few recipes I could add to my “Never have I ever heard of such a thing” list. These include: chipped beef and shrimp casserole, cow foot jello, pig lickin’ good cake, and tomato soup cake.

Whatever I selected for this month’s recipe was going to have to be prepared in our travel trailer, so I didn’t want to select a recipe that was too complicated or frankly, too stinky. (It’s close quarters in a fifth wheel!) Also in that vein, the RV park where we are visiting hosted their version of The Newlywed Game last week. Thank goodness we were not selected to be contestants because when I heard some of the questions, I couldn’t believe that after 43 years, I would have no idea how my better half would answer most of them.

But there’s one question I can answer, and if I’m lucky, some day I’ll be participating in a bonus round somewhere when they ask it: What is your partner’s favorite soup? Ohh…Ohh…pick me! Pick me! I know this one! The answer is CLAM CHOWDER!

And lo and behold, there it was on page 14—a recipe by Gen Parks, of Grass Lake, for “Clam Chowder”! Admittedly, I was a bit concerned about this soup passing the stink test in our trailer, but hey, sometimes you just have to sacrifice for love! As an aside, I might add that Gen Parks must be quite a cook because her recipes are peppered all throughout this community cookbook.

“Genevieve was a very sweet woman,” recalled Joan Tucker, SCN board president and Grass Lake resident. “She and her family were very involved in the Sunday Swiss Steak Dinner at another local church. It was the best local community dinner ever.”

That was enough to convince me to start gathering the ingredients for Gen’s “Clam Chowder.” I had a good feeling about this one, so I decided to increase the recipe by one half in order to have enough to take to a potluck the next day—how is THAT for confidence!

Gen’s recipe was pretty straightforward, but I did make a few notes for future reference in case I were to make this recipe again:

• I had two choices in canned clams—chopped or whole baby clams. I decided to try both, but in the finished recipe, the whole clams were a bit chewy.
• There’s a fine line between a good chowder and a glorified potato soup, so don’t use too many potatoes. I used seven smallish russet potatoes, which was perfect for the increased amount of soup I was making.
• To amp up the clam flavor a bit, I used a small bottle of clam juice in place of some of the water the recipe called for.
• Gen’s recipe instructs to first mix the water and juice from the clams, bring it to a boil, and then add the potatoes and onions. I changed this up a bit by melting the butter and sautéing the onion for about five minutes. Then I added the diced potatoes to the butter and onion mixture and cooked those together for about eight minutes. I added the clam juice/water combination to the pot and simmered for 15 minutes before picking up where Gen’s recipe left off.
• Rather than warming the cream over hot water, I used my microwave and gradually warmed the cream using power level 2 for a minute at a time until the cream no longer felt chilled.
• The finished recipe was pretty good, but I felt it needed a tiny bit more flavor, so I added about one-half teaspoon of garlic powder and stirred well. That did the trick!

This chowder really came together nicely; it was smooth and creamy and the cream didn’t separate. When I dished some out for the resident taste tester, he said with a smile, “Yep, this tastes like clam chowder.” This may not sound like the best compliment ever, but as a man of few words, I knew what he meant: This recipe hit the perfect balance of clam flavor and potato. And that really was the goal.

In retrospect, my rather limited spice collection in the trailer didn’t include thyme, but if it did, I may have tried adding a tiny bit to this chowder. Another suggestion: I probably would have added a cup of chopped celery to the onion/potato mixture.

Just to prove how pleased I was with Gen’s “Clam Chowder” I took it to a dominoes game potluck the next day. Overnight, the flavors mingled. making the chowder more flavorful and the whole baby clams less chewy. And unless those who attended brought their poker faces to a dominoes game, I’ll take their compliments as further proof that Gen Parks’ “Clam Chowder” recipe is a keeper.