If you grew up in New England, you know the importance of a good clam chowder. There is nothing that says home to me like a nice hot bowl of this yummy goodness. Unfortunately, indulging in a good cup of “chowda” these days, would put me out of commission for the better part of a week.
A few weeks ago, my husband and I went away to a family wedding in Maine, and my craving for New England Clam Chowder reared it’s ugly head again. One evening, while looking almost too intently at the couple dining at the table next to us enjoy their cups of chowder, my husband challenged me to try and make a Paleo version. At first I thought he was crazy – there was no way I could replicate this without cream- but after thinking about it for a few minutes, I came up with an idea. After a few tweaks, I am finally ready to unveil the result.
Adapting a Classic
The biggest challenge to this chowder, was replacing the cream. In my “pre-paleo” days, one of my favorite tricks to replace cream in a soup, was to throw in a small skinned “creamer potato” into the broth and puree it. Obviously, white potato’s are a “no-no”, but parsnips and cauliflower…. now we were talking. The next thing I needed to address was the broth. Normally, I create my clam broth by steaming clams in white wine (trust me, this is amazing). While the wine does add an amazing richness to chowder, using water works just as well for rendering a good broth, as long as I added that richness of flavor in another way. I chose to do this by adding a nice thick-cut bacon to the chowder (because everything is better with bacon ) and chopped leeks.
The key to a really hearty and good chowder is the clams. I chose to use both little neck and cherry stone clams. Cherry stone clams are nice and meaty, and will give you a lot of good broth. Little neck clams are smaller, but also add a good texture. I rounded out the rest of the chowder with the usual suspects: carrots, celery, and (of course) sweet potato. In a perfect world, I would use purple sweet potato – but alas I couldn’t find any.
The Result
While this isn’t exactly like the classic – it does hit the spot. I don’t miss the cream at all – and if anything, the flavor of the clams is able to come through even more without it. The other great benefit to this version of chowder, is that it is much lighter – and thus can be enjoyed on the hottest of summer days as well as on a nice fall evening. You can bet this is making it into the regular rotation at my house!
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