Corn And Crab Chowder With Fritters

by Chef Rob Feenie

This sensational chowder is easy to make once you find the crab. Rob Feenie found snow crab claws frozen at the supermarket and they worked beautifully. He removed the crabmeat and roasted the shells.

Chowder:
1 pound crab shells
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 cups thinly sliced Spanish onion
1 cup chopped celery
2/3 cup chopped carrot
3 ears corn, kernels removed and cobs saved (about 4 cups of kernels)
8 cups chicken stock
2 cups whipping cream
6 basil leaves
Italian flat-leaf parsley, roughly chopped, for garnish

Fritters:
3/4 cup corn kernels (1 to 2 ears)
1/3 cup finely sliced basil leaves
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/3 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup milk
2 large eggs, separated
4 ounces crabmeat
Salt and freshly ground pepper
Vegetable oil for frying
2 tablespoons chopped parsley

Preheat oven to 400 F.

Place crab shells in a roasting pan and drizzle with olive oil. Place pan in oven and roast for about 45 minutes, or until fragrant and light brown. Let cool.

Heat extra virgin olive oil in a saucepan over medium heat. Add onion, celery and carrot, then cook for 5 to 7 minutes or until onions are translucent. Add corn kernels and cook for 5 minutes. Add corn cobs, stock and roasted crab shells and simmer together for 45 minutes. Remove and discard corn cobs and crab shells. Stir in cream and basil. Bring just to a boil, then remove from the stove and let cool for 15 minutes. Purée soup in a blender. Strain through a fine-mesh sieve, discard solids and let cool.

Combine corn, basil, flour and baking soda in a bowl to make fritters. In a separate bowl, mix together milk and egg yolks. Add milk mixture to flour mixture, stirring well. Fold in crabmeat and season with salt and pepper. Beat egg whites in a bowl until stiff, then fold into batter. Cover and refrigerate for 5 to 10 minutes.
Preheat 2 inches of vegetable oil to 350 F in a wok or deep pot.

Spoon 1 tablespoon of batter at a time into the hot oil. Cook 4 fritters at a time, making sure not to crowd them, for about 3 minutes, turning once. Take fritters out and drain on paper towels. Season with salt and pepper.

To serve, reheat soup. Either place 2 to 3 fritters inside each of 8 warmed soup bowls and ladle chowder over them, or serve the fritters on the side. Garnish with parsley.

Wine pairing by Beppi Crosariol:

Wherever there’s corn, there’s usually a fine excuse to open a chardonnay. The popular white variety, typically full-bodied and barrel-aged to add toasty richness, often also has a buttery texture and taste. That’s just one reason it goes so well with corn. For this rich soup, look for a particularly rich chardonnay bordering on sweetness, ideally from a warm-weather region such as California, Chile, Australia or British Columbia’s Okanagan Valley. At the buttery-toasty end of the scale, consider Beringer Private Reserve Chardonnay from California. From Rob Feenie’s home province of British Columbia, there’s the excellent Mission Hill Chardonnay Reserve.