Chorizo chowder is a firm favourite of mine. I first made this soup when I lived in Spain and the Chorizo was cheap and plentiful. It is better known as a winter warmer soup, but I enjoy the spicy, smoky taste so much, I make it all year round.
You can get fresh whole chorizo at most supermarket deli-counters nowadays, so make sure you use whole chorizo sausages and slice them yourself, the packets of ready-sliced chorizo you can buy are too thin for this soup.
Chorizo comes in two varieties, dulce (sweet) and picante (spicy). I prefer to use the picante version, but the choice is yours, either is delicious. For the uninitiated, be aware that most chorizo sausages come with a tight paper or sausage skin that needs to be peeled off before slicing, I made the mistake years ago of slicing it first then spent the next 25 minutes trying to pick the skin off the individual chunks.
Ingredients:
- A good knob of butter
- 1 Onion, finely chopped
- 4 Cloves of garlic, crushed
- 650g Potatoes, peeled and cubed
- 1 Leek, sliced
- 1 tsp Cayenne Pepper
- 1 Chorizo sausage (approx. 250g)
Method:
Heat the butter in a large pot and gently fry the onion, crushed cloves of garlic and the cubed potatoes for about 15 minutes. Add the sliced leek and 1 teaspoon of cayenne pepper. Stir through and cook for another few minutes.
Add 1 litre of vegetable stock, bring to boil and then simmer for about 30 minutes until the potatoes are soft and beginning to break up. At this stage you could use a potato masher to roughly mash the potatoes, I prefer to blitz the soup with a hand blender until smooth.
Slice the chorizo sausage into 1cm slices and add to the soup. Simmer for another 10 minutes or until the soup turns to a rich orange colour as the oil from the chorizo seeps into the broth.
I like to serve this with thick slices of buttered baguette or alternatively with thick slices of garlic bread.
Why not leave a comment and let me know what you think!
