Make Corn Soup

One of the best ways to use up summer's corn bounty is by making it into delicious soup. Creamed corn soup is a classic choice sure to please any crowd. Its sweet flavor pairs perfectly with toppings like scallions, bacon, crab or peppers. If you want to know how to turn those ears of corn into something truly delicious, See Step 1 and beyond.

Ingredients

  • 8 ears fresh corn
  • 1 diced onion
  • 1/2 cup butter
  • 4 cups chicken or vegetable stock
  • 1 cup cream or half and half
  • Salt and pepper to taste
  • Optional toppings: sliced scallions, bacon, chopped peppers, crabmeat

Steps

Prepping the Ingredients

  1. Shuck the corn. Sweet corn soup is made with corn at the height of its ripeness in the summer. Take an ear of fresh corn and pull the leaves down to reveal the silk. Use your fingers to pull all the leaves and silk from the corn. Chop off the bottom knob with a sharp butcher knife.
    • Look for fresh corn at your grocery store or farmer's market in the summer months. Corn grown locally will have the best flavor, since it doesn't have to travel far.
    • This recipe tastes best with fresh corn, but you can use canned or frozen corn if you don't have fresh corn on hand. Make sure you use corn preserved without sugar or other additives, which could affect the flavor of the soup.
  2. Grate the corn. Use a cheese grater with large holes to grate the kernels from the cobs into a big bowl. Keep grating all sides of the corn until you've collected all of the fresh, sweet kernels. To get the remaining juices, use the blunt side of the knife to scrape down the corn cobs. Neglecting this last step will mean missing out on a lot of each piece's flavor.
  3. Dice the onion. A sharp white onion will provide a nice contrast to the sweetness of the corn. Place the onion on a cutting board and use a sharp knife to slice it from root to tip. Peel the skin from both halves. Lay the halves flat-side down on the cutting board. Make a series of parallel cuts in one direction, then turn the onion half 90 degrees and slice in the other direction.
    • Experiment with red onion, yellow onion and shallots to bring out different flavors in the corn.
    • If you wish to omit the onion, you can use celery in its place.

Cooking the Soup

  1. Melt the butter. Place it in a large Dutch oven or soup pot over medium high heat and heat the butter until it's melted and beginning to sizzle.
  2. Add the corn and onions. Put the corn and onions together in the pot with the butter. Give them a stir, and cook for about 5 minutes, until the onions turn translucent. Do not overcook the onions and corn - if they start to turn brown, reduce the heat immediately. Browning the corn will give its sweet flavor a sharp edge.
  3. Add the broth. Pour it over the onions and corn, and turn up the heat so that the mixture comes to a boil. Then reduce it to a simmer and cook for 15 minutes.
    • If you have homemade chicken or vegetable broth on hand, the flavor of your soup will be wonderfully enhanced. If not, choose a good-quality broth without a lot of preservatives.
    • Taste the soup after it has simmered for awhile. Have the flavors melded and enhanced one another? If not, allow it to cook for five minutes more.
  4. Puree the soup. Carefully pour it into a blender and put the lid on. Don't fill the blender more than 1/2 way to the rim, or the hot soup may cause the lid to fly off and make a mess. Puree the soup until it's smooth, then pour it into a separate bowl or pot. Keep doing this in batches until all the soup has been pureed.
  5. Strain the soup. Pour it through a fine-mesh strainer to get rid of the tiny corn skins and other solid bits. What's left will be a pure, silky, golden corn-flavored liquid.

Finishing the Soup

  1. Season the soup to taste. Add salt and pepper, taste the soup, and add more if necessary. At this point you can also add seasonings like flavored salt, dried thyme or cayenne pepper.
  2. Add the cream. Just before serving, swirl in the cream. You can heat the cream first if you don't want it to affect the soup's temperature. Be sure not to let it come to a boil.
  3. Serve with garnishes of your choice. Corn soup is amazing with a variety of different garnishes. You can serve it plain, but try it with the following choices to liven things up:
    • Chopped scallions
    • Chopped bacon
    • Chopped pieces of white crabmeat
    • Chopped chipotle peppers

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