Smoky Bacon Corn Chowder, a family favorite...

I've made this recipe forever, but now I do shortcuts to make it better without sacrificing taste.  I use frozen Ore-Ida Cubed potatoes, so much easier than peeling and cubing all those potatoes, and the flavor is exactly the same. 

This recipe is adapted from an old Betty Crocker Cookbook from the 70’s.  It’s a big recipe, I never cut it down, leftovers are great, and you can give it to family and friends, it reheats beautifully, too.

1 bag of the frozen diced potatoes.

If you prefer to cook potatoes yourself:

5 large potatoes, cubed and cooked in salted water (do not overcook, this will take about 10-15 minutes for them to cook).  

8 cups milk (part half and half is awesome, whole milk is good, 2% milk is acceptable, but skim milk is not rich enough)  
1 large onion, diced  
1 lb. bacon, slice the entire stack of raw bacon at once, cutting it in small slices when very cold, it's easy to do it this way, then it fries evenly and you don't have to try and crumble it after it's cooked
3/4 cup flour  
2 cans cream style corn  
1 bag frozen corn  
shredded cheese, chopped scallions and crumbled bacon for garnish

While potatoes are cooking, saute bacon in large skillet.  Remove when crisp, drain on paper towels and crumble.

Put onions in bacon drippings and cook until tender.  Remove onions with slotted spoon and put 3/4 cup flour into drippings, stirring constantly.  I usually take this off the burner, as it thickens really quickly.  Then I stir in 2-3 cups of the milk, and put it back on the burner for a minute or so, whisking constantly. 

Meanwhile put the remaining milk in the microwave and nuke it until it’s warm.  If you put cold milk into warm drippings, it can curdle, so always warm everything.  I warm the bag of frozen corn as well.

Put the 2 cans of cream style corn, the bag of warmed frozen corn in a large stockpot, add the onions, drain the cooked potatoes, add them, and I use a strainer to add the flour mixture to the ingredients in the crockpot, as you don’t want any lumps from the flour.  Add salt and pepper to taste, I usually add 1-2 teaspoons of salt and a teaspoon of pepper.  Heat until thick, but not boiling.

I make yummy cornbread, tweaking a Jiffy mix, adding sour cream makes it really moist - Here's the recipe

Note:  The drippings from a pound of bacon is not too much, don’t decrease the amount of bacon grease, this is a really big recipe, and you need that much to flavor it.  I sometimes add 2-3 tablespoons of butter as well, if I’m making it with 2% milk to give it a richer flavor.

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