Dairy Free Seafood Chowder

About Milk Substitutes

Once you decide to go dairy free you are confronted with a huge variety of choices for alternatives. As you start to cook dairy free you discover that no one milk substitute is the right choice for everything. If I look in our fridge I will find 5 different types of milk all of the time and various others at other times. My kids drink almond milk(based on taste alone), a mix of 3/4 unsweetened chocolate and 1/4 sweetened original. I drink vanilla hemp milk, and we cook most often with vanilla or plain rice milk. Also in my cabinet I have canned and dried coconut milk, and dried potato milk(darifree) as well as canned coconut cream. As you cook you find that different milks lend themselves to different recipes or tastes better. That is the case with the Darifree potato milk we use here and for most cream soups.

Dairy Free Seafood Chowder

This recipe was part of a quest for summer comfort food. Growing up in New England we ate clam chowder all year long but in the summer my brothers dove for fresh clams and the chowder was the best. Here I have recaptured the essence the tastes in a form we all can eat.

1 lb. scallops, I usually use bay scallops. If you use sea scallops you will have to chop them.

1 lb. shrimp, cleaned, all shells removed but raw

1 lb. firm white fish, cubed, I have used haddock and cod

2 large potatoes, peeled and cubed

4 cups water

2 vegetarian boullion cubes(each makes 2 cups)

1 large yellow onion minced(it is important to use a sharp yellow onion. Others tend to leave the chowder too sweet.)

4 large stalks celery minced

2/3 cup darifree potato milk powder

1 bay leaf

1 tsp thyme

2 tsp dried parsley

2 tbsp canola oil

In a large stock pot cook the onions and celery in canola oil until onions are translucent. Add the water, bay leaf, boullion cubes and potatoes. Boil until the potatoes are just starting to soften. Remove 1 cup liquid to mix with potato milk powder. Turn down to simmer, add all the seafood, spices and potato milk. Cook until shrimp turns just pink. This got rave reviews here and from all who sampled it. Enjoy!