Crab and Corn Chowder with Pasta

In all fairness, Rachael Ray calls this "Crab and Corn Chowda-Mac", as a mix of New England meals: corn chowder with crab meat and mac and cheese. How New England is mac and cheese? Don't ask. But, I live here now and I'm trying more seafood items, so this seems like a pretty easy way to nail all my goals. A forewarning: the quantity of ingredients used and the temperatures I cooked at rendered the milky chowder-ness gone. I'm not sure how liquid Rachael planned this dish to be, but mine ended up more floury. Enough rambling, on with the cooking!

I don't have a lot of pictures for you this time. This meal was actually quite easy to make. Choose a large type of pasta (I chose rigatoni because it was, well, large) and cook it until al dente. This can happen while you're preparing the chowder itself. Slice up some bacon, an onion, celery ribs, and a small red bell pepper. Put the bacon on first to cook for a few minutes, then add the chopped onion and celery, cook a while longer, then add the bell pepper.

Pretty simple so far. The interesting part (and the first part that makes it properly chowder) is to add two tablespoons of flour. This immediately solidifies around the bacon and veggies and results in a stiffer concoction. Adding a cup of stock and a cup of milk will complete the chowderification of our meal. I think, in retrospect, I shouldn't have halved these liquid quantities as I did the majority of Rachael's servings (I'm not feeding four, I'm on a diet). Using a full cup (I used half) of each would have resulted in a far more chowder-like dinner. Anyway, once the milk is bubbling - and, presumably, before it has cooked down - add the crab meat and corn kernels. Heat this through and season with a cup or two of shredded white Cheddar cheese and cayenne pepper.

So, yes, we can observe my real problem. Many pictures of these dishes are turning out unappetizing (I swear they look better in real life). A close flash is necessary to get sharp images, but the flash itself reflects off the often moist food in a terrible way. Turn the flash off and my shaky hands ruin all photos. The proper method of photographing culinary renditions would involve (I suspect) large, indirect lights and a tripod-mounted SLR camera. I, however, do not have a thousand dollars to spend on photographic equipment. Nevertheless, I will do my best to improve future pictures. Oh. Right. The meal. It was actually quite delicious, especially if you enjoy crab meat. Could this meal work without pasta? Certainly. The cheese and bacon add a fantastic flavor (or mask the crab, if that's your thing) and more milk next time would've given us a proper chowder even a native Northerner would be proud of (I'm just faking it). See ya next time!