Skip to content

Manhattan Clam Chowder

Manhattan Clam Chowder uses a tomato base, while its more common New England Cousin uses cream.

Ingredients:

  • 2 or 3 6.5 oz cans of clams, with juice
  • 4 or 5 bacon slices, diced
  • 1 onion, diced
  • 1.5 potatoes, diced
  • 2 tomatoes, cubed
  • 1 bunch spinach, cut.
  • 1 28oz can of peeled tomatoes, cubed, with juice
  • 1 cup celery
  • 1 cup carrots (i don’t like it, you might)
  • 5-6 cups water
  • basil (less),
  • parseley (2T),
  • thyme (more),
  • bay (2 leaves),
  • pepper, salt (to taste)

In a big pot:

  1. saute bacon until crisp, remove from their fat and set aside.
  2. add onion and potatoes to bacon fat (if you want to be more health-conscious at the expense of taste, you can discard the bacon grease and use olive oil).
  3. saute onion and potatoes for 7 minutes.
  4. Add celery, carrots, and half the thyme to the onion and potato.
  5. Saute for 5 minutes more.
  6. Add in water, tomatoes, tomato juices, and clam juices.
  7. Bring to a boil.
  8. Add the bay, basil, pepper, salt, rest of the thyme, and most of the parseley
  9. Cover and simmer for 20-25 minutes (or however long it takes to tenderize vegetables), stirring as you will.
  10. Add spinach and clams, and simmer uncovered for 5 minutes more.

Upon serving:

  • sprinkle with the bacon and the leftover parseley (don’t cook the chowder with the bacon inside, or the bacony flavor goodness will disappear).

Serves 5-6.