Gotta try this

I finally splurged and bought a cast iron casserole pot thingy. I was so excited that I decided to go ahead and make one of my favorite Autumn dishes--clam chowder. I got this recipe from Rachel Ray, but I've doctored it a little. This is just a basis, so change it as you want.

Ingredients:

4 small cans of chopped clams with the juice
3 ribs of celery, diced
4 slices of bacon, cut into 1/2 in pieces
1 small onion or 1/2 of regular size (I can never find small onions), diced
2 teaspoons thyme leaves
salt and pepper
3 cups of chicken broth
1 pint of half and half, or 2 cups of whole milk, milk, whatever your cow brings you
potato--I am not a huge potato fan, so I only dice one Idaho potato. Dice as much as you want or you can try adding frozen hash browns.
2-3 tablespoons of butter
2-3 tablespoons of flour
dash or 2 of hot sauce

Do this:

Place bacon and butter in a big pot (my new casserole pot thingy came in handy here!). Once the butter melts and the bacon starts to cook, put in onion and celery. Let cook about 5 min or so. Add thyme and hot sauce. I add about 10 shakes or so of the hot sauce--not enough to make my nose run, but enough to smell it cooking. Add the flour. Let cook about 1 minute.

Add the broth slowly as you use your spoon to scrap up any brown stuff on the bottom of the pan. Keep stirring to thoroughly mix flour and broth. Add milk. I do use half and half because the cream helps the chowder get thick and tasty. Add potato. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat. Add the clams (be sure and add the juice too). Salt and pepper as desired. Be careful the clams will be salty...start small, taste, then add if necessary. Cook about 15 min over medium to medium low heat.



This is fabulous with sourdough bread. You can be really cool and serve it in a bread bowl. Or just eat it without bread. I don't care....I love it with bread, on my head, in a bed, wearing red.....

I've added carrots with the celery (didn't like it as well--carrots are sweet). I've tried doing it low fat--skim milk, margarine, turkey bacon. It's ok, but the real stuff is much better. This last time I added about 1/4 cup of slurry of corn starch and cold water--I like thick clam chowder and I cannot put enough flour in it to thicken it. This helped a lot.

Seriously, folks, if you like clam chowder, then you gotta try making this. I cannot stand the canned stuff after making this. It's so easy and very yummy.