In the native world a person should always have food at the ready . If you have anyone over to your house it is customary to feed them. In this way everyone is cared for . So here is a recipe that is one of my favorite and you can keep it in a slow cooker or over low heat all day long.
Corn Chowder
8 cups water in pot Chicken or game bird
8 green onions 1 tsp. minced garlic
4 stalks celery chopped 2 tsp. sage
pepper to taste salt to taste
½ tsp. thyme ½ tsp. dried oregano
2-4 cups frozen corn (fresh, dried, parched)
2 cups sliced carrots 1-2 cups chopped mushroom
1 -2 cup corn meal 2 cups half and half (can use heavy cream, or whole milk, or even skim milk. Or can do without milk as the old Tsalagi did not use milk in anything.)
Boil game bird or chicken in pot until done. Remove bird and de-bone. Tear meat into small pieces and set aside. You need only a small amount in pot. You can freeze rest to put into another pot of soup.
In broth you will put two to four cups of corn, fresh, dried, parched, frozen. If it is dried or parched it will need to cook much longer. I use frozen most of time.
Take eight small green onions and cut bottoms up to green stems into small pieces and add to pot. Add two to three cups sliced carrots.. One teaspoon of diced garlic. Sage. (If using leaf sage put into two or three leaves, four or five if you like sage. If using ground, two teaspoon). Dice four to six stalks celery. Chop up two cups mushrooms into small pieces. Add bay leaf and little oregano and salt to taste.
Simmer this for two hours.
Add about six medium potatoes peeled and diced into pieces size of dime to nickel. Simmer half hour and then add two cups half and half. Pop used to use cream but changed to half and half. Can use skim milk if you need to.
Simmer another half hour. Add corn meal to thicken and let simmer shortly or rest of day on very low heat. The longer this cooks the better.
Just before you are ready to serve, chop the remaining green stems of the green onions and sprinkle on top each bowl of chowder and serve. Corn bread is good with this or whole wheat buns.
If you need a native version of Corn bread let me know i have a few including simple corn cakes.!!
