Quick Takes.... Kids Easy Corn Chowder

I start my kids making dinners early so that by the time they are grown they have a whole repertoire of meals they're comfortable making. Right now I have three kiddos still at home [12, 15, and 18] and each is responsible for making & cleaning up supper one night every week. This is an easy, cheap take on an old New England classic and the basic version is one of the first meals they learned.

Basic Version: Fancy it up a bit:

1-2 cans of creamed corn batch of basic version

1-2 cans of cooked potatoes ADD:

2-4 cups milk dried minced onion

salt, pepper, parsley [or saute fresh!]

parsley flakes or chives cooked bacon,

broken into bits

Empty creamed corn into cooking pot, saving cans. Drain off potato water from potato cans. Cut potatoes into chunks and add to pot. Fill each empty corn can 2/3 full with milk. Stir to get corn residue into milk then add the corn/milk to the pot. Mix corn, potatoes and milk. Heat over medium to low heat until heated through. [Stir occasionally.] Sprinkle salt and pepper only as needed for taste. Add parsley flakes or chives for color and garnish. Serve.

For fancier versions add any of these options:

[Great for older, stove safer kids.]

1. Saute fresh onions [or used dried flakes]. Add to chowder

2. Substitute fresh parsley and/or chives.

3. Cook bacon, crumble into bits and add to chowder.

[Ready to use bacon works fine too.]

Remember to leave this out for vegetarians!!

Note: For young children, everything can be mixed together in a bowl and then just poured by a grownup into the cooking pot. Also, you can use more milk or less depending on your taste, just as you can change the potato chunk size depending on your taste. The two pics above show the range and with and without bacon versions.