Pacific Coast Seafood Chowder

Along with living in Alaska and working at the wonderful Seven Glaciers Resort, I’ve lived up and down the Pacific Coast. In doing so I’ve learned to do what every do what every good chef does: pull from the locally available foods and recipes. The following recipe is a bit more complicated then the last one for Southern Lemon Chess Pie, but well worth the effort.

Pacific Coast Seafood Chowder

1 sachet d'epices (cheese cloth tied tight) filled with the following:
5 stalks of lemongrass cut into 1 inch pieces
1 ounce of peeled ginger
3 cloves of crushed garlic
12 magrut lime leaves
64 fl oz clam juice
48 fl oz coconut milk
12 fl oz dry white wine
12 oz of lemon juice, freshly squeezed.
8 fl oz heavy cream, heated
2 oz red curry paste
1 oz cornstarch
1 lb of snapper fillet, skinned, and diced medium
1 lb shrimp, peeled, deveined, and diced medium
1 oz of basil, cut chiffonade for garnish

In a large nonreactive pot (clay, copper, enamel, glass, plastic, hard-anodized or stainless steel) combine the wine and sachet d'epices filled with all of your goodies and bring to a boil. Once it boils, reduce the temperature and simmer for 10 minutes and then add the clam juice, coconut milk, curry paste and cream and return it to a boil.

In a small separate dish, combine the cornstarch with some water until it has the consistency of heavy cream and then add the mixture to the soup and cook for 5 minutes on a simmer, or until the soup starts to thicken. Remove the sachet d'epices and add the snapper and shrimp until cooked, about 5-7 minutes.

Season with the lemon juice and salt to taste. Serve hot.

Note: To make ahead of time, quickly cool the soup after removing the sachet d'epices (usually by transferring it to a refrigerator). When it is time to serve, bring it back to a simmer and add the snapper and shrimp.