A quick corn and sausage chowder recipe that's done in about 30 minutes, using frozen corn and any sausage you have on hand. As perfect for a wintery evening as it is in autumn made with fresh corn! Just one of our Quick Healthy Recipes.
I absolutely love chowders. The creaminess and slightly buttery flavor are always so warm and comforting, especially in the depths of winter. Whether it's a vegetable, seafood, or plain potato chowder, I love them all.
This recipe for corn and sausage chowder is one of the recipes that finds its way to our menus often. It's made in about 30 minutes, start-to-finish, uses either fresh or frozen corn (hopefully the organic corn you grew and froze just for times such as this), and any type of sausage you have on hand.
The combination is at once classic and fresh - and so warming and comforting whether eaten in the winter or late summer made with garden fresh corn.
This particular corn and sausage chowder has one unusual ingredient, basil, that I think helps create that lovely fresh taste.
Corn and Sausage Chowder
Ingredients
- Sausage, any kind (pork, chicken, turkey; bulk, flavored, cased, kielbasa, etc.) Note: I'm showing both kinds of sausage - cased and bulk - in the photo for options, you don't need both.
- Corn, fresh or frozen
- Potatoes
- Onion
- Garlic
- Chicken broth (store bought or homemade from your freezer)
- Milk (or a milk substitute you prefer)
- Flour (for gluten free, use cornstarch, potato starch, or arrowroot)
- Butter (or bacon grease for dairy free)
- Dried basil
- Salt & pepper
- Chopped parsley or chives for garnish, optional
My favorite sausage to use is a crumbled spicy bulk sausage, but I use whatever I have on hand. With all the different flavored sausages you can find in the stores, it's fun to try different types.
Supplies
- Large soup pot, at least 3 quart size
- Wooden spoon
- Glass measuring cups, measuring spoons, etc.
- Chef's knife and cutting board
Instructions
I added "quick" to the title of this recipe because few chowders really take that much time to make.
It's simply a matter of sautéing vegetables with any protein (or butter if meatless), cooking them with the potatoes in a broth, and then adding the milk and extras to heat through, and this recipe is no different.
- First, you'll melt the butter or bacon fat along with cooking the sausage.
- Then add the chopped onion and garlic and saute them for a minute. Sprinkle the flour, if using (for gluten free, you'll add thickener at the end), over all and stir to incorporate.
- Pour in the broth and add potatoes, salt, pepper, and basil. Bring to a boil and cook for 10-15 minutes until the potatoes are tender.
- Add in the corn and milk (with thickener added for gluten free), and cook at a simmer for a few minutes to heat through.
- Serve with a chopped parsley garnish.
Chowder is such a simple soup to make with real ingredients tailored to your family's taste. And the corn and sausage in this recipe are a wonderful combination.
How thick is this chowder?
Some chowders are so thick it's more like a gravy, but that's not my favorite, so I like to meet somewhere in the middle - creamy enough to be a chowder, but soupy enough to be a, well...soup.
Feel free to adjust the amount of thickener to your tastes, though!
What do you serve with this corn and sausage chowder?
This chowder (and all chowders, really) are best served with a green salad and some kind of bread. Here are some of my favorite sides:
- Simple leafy green salad with homemade vinaigrette.
- Orange Almond Salad.
- Flaky homemade biscuits, which only take 20 minutes to make!
- Sourdough artisan bread or easy yeast artisan bread.
- Sourdough artisan rolls or soft 100% whole wheat rolls.
Quick Corn and Sausage Chowder Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 pound sausage bulk or smoked, cut or crumbled, depending on type
- 2 tablespoons butter or bacon fat
- 1 large onion chopped
- 1 clove garlic minced (about 1 teaspoon)
- 3 tablespoons flour (if you need gluten free, see note*)
- 2 ½ cups chicken broth
- 1 ½ to 2 pounds potatoes about 3 large, peeled and diced
- 1 to 2 teaspoons salt to taste (using unsalted broth will need more)
- 1 teaspoon dried basil
- 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
- 2 ½ cups corn kernels frozen or fresh
- 2 cups milk
- Chopped fresh parsley or chives for garnish
Instructions
- Melt butter in a large stockpot and brown sausage.
- Add onion and garlic and cook until onion is softened. If using flour to thicken, sprinkle it on the meat and onion now and stir well (see note for alternative).
- Pour broth over ingredients in pot and stir well to incorporate the flour. Then add the potatoes, salt, basil, and pepper, cover and bring to a boil; turn heat to medium and cook about 15 minutes or until potatoes are tender.
- Stir in corn and milk, bring to a simmer (just under a boil) over medium-high heat to heat and thicken.
- Serve topped with chopped parsley or chives.
Notes
Nutrition
Other Easy Soups To Try:
This recipe has been updated - it was originally published in January of 2015.
Simple Real Food Dinner Menus + Shopping Lists
Subscribe to the popular newsletters AND get access to this Seasonal Menu Ebook with 20 weeks of dinner menu ideas in the VIP Subscriber Library - with more notebooks, checklists & recipes. We'll never send spam - read our Privacy Policy here.
Sheilah says
This soup was amazing and so easy!
thank you Jaime
Jami says
Yay! So glad you tried this and enjoyed it Sheilah 🙂
Kathy Thomas says
Hi Miss Jamie,
I love your recipes. I started my cooking from scratch when I stumbled upon your blog. (Lucky me)
I have a crazy question. When you use the sausage in the casing, Do I remove the slimy casing. I have done it
and it falls apart. I may as well have used the ground sausage.
Thanks for taking these silly questions.
Jami says
Not a crazy question at all, Kathy! If the sausage is uncooked with casing, you'd need to cook them first to be able to cut them into rounds.
Many recipes actually do call for removing the casing and using the sausage just like ground sausage (which I don't get - why not just buy in ground and skip all that casing removing? Lol.)
For this recipe, it's probably easiest to buy ground sausage and just cook that or use precooked sausage that you can cut up before continuing with the recipe.
And I'm SO glad you're loving the recipes and they helped you start cooking from scratch - yay!!
Ann Lown says
Love it! I immersion-blend part of the corn with the milk (substitute) in a 4-cup glass measure, before adding at the end -- thickens nicely without flour or other thickener. Expands the corn-y flavor too. Thanks for a great pantry recipe!
Jami says
Great tip, Ann - thank you!
Susan Boyd says
I've been making this chowder for awhile. It has become one of my family's favorites! Thanks so much for the recipe.
Jami says
I'm so glad to know that, Susan - thank you!
Shelly says
We love corn chowder at our house. I usually make it with bacon, but sausage sounds delicious too. Salad and bread are our favorite sides to have with chowder.
Jami says
Bacon, sausage - it's all good, isn't it Shelly? 😉