Father's Day Corn Soup

In honor of my dad, who passed away five years ago, I'm posting his most notable contribution to my family's culinary library: Corn Soup. Not chowder, ya'll, it's simply soup. My dad was a funny one when it came to cooking; he wasn't afraid to try something new, or to be "wrong", and he never allowed other people's opinions to affect his own. I was embarrassed by this as a kid, but now I only hope I inherited some of those genes from him.

This recipe, by any organic and farm-to-table standards, is eight different kinds of wrong, but we used to ask for this all the time as kids. By the time I was 10 or so, I could make this on my own. It was one of the first recipes I ever "mastered".

I've kept this recipe tucked away quietly in my head, and don't make it often, but I still get a hankerin' for my dad's Corn Soup every now and then, and I sometimes find myself absentmindedly perusing the red and white cans in the canned soup aisles.



Here's to sharing weirdly delicious recipes with the world. Happy Father's Day, Dad!

Corn Soup a la Heinz

1 can Campbell's condensed cream of chicken soup
1 can creamed corn (regular corn works too)
1 handful chopped celery leaves (from the leafy tops of the celery stalks)
1 egg, beaten
pinch ground white pepper

Add cream of chicken soup to a medium-sized pot. Cook over medium heat until soup starts to sizzle (yes, sizzle. Dunno why, it's just what Dad did and that's the way I do it). Add a soup-can full of water and corn to the pot, using a fork if needed to break up condensed soup. Cook until corn and soup are heated through. Add celery leaves and whisk in beaten egg with a fork. Season with white pepper.

Sometimes I'll add some dried fresh tagliatelle in broken pieces to make a noodle soup, but only when I'm feeling frisky. This could also possibly be the perfect bachelor recipe, but the celery leaves might be a bit of a stretch for the average bachelor.