Sausage and corn chowder

After my successful foray into making Brunswick stew I am now going to make a LONG time family favorite recipe my dear sister gave me ages ago. It IS more than the sum of its parts somehow. It i ready in under an hour.

Corn and Sausage Chowder

1# sausage--mild or hot-browned and drained
1C chopped onions
1 28 oz. can diced tomatoes
1 soup can of water
1 can cream style corn (I like white)
1 can whole kernel corn (I like white)
3 TBS dried basil (amount is correct!)
Coarse black pepper--to taste --1/2 tbs?
2 or 3 yellow or red potatoes, peeled and chunked (optional)
Simmer all together for 30-45 minutes

When ready to serve stir in a 5 oz. can of evaporated milk and bring to a simmer.

I like to serve this with a fruit salad like a Waldorf. Maybe some corn bread.

I'm intrigued. I do something like this but not with basil and I usually include some kind of stock for flavor. No salt at all?

This is still one of my all-time favorite go-to soups.

This works exactly as is - one of the few recipes that I never seem to think needs tweaking. I think that the salt is about right with prepackaged sausage, which is what I use, and the salt in the two cans of corn. And I am a salt-a-holic.

Missy has said it all--it has enough from the other ingredients for me also.

I have leftover mild Italian sausage from last night so I'm using that and making this tonight. I'm in a rush and winging it as usual with what I have on hand.

First I have to double the recipe to feed my ravenous horde. So I came up short on half a can of diced tomato so threw in a small can of tomato puree. Plenty of canned corn but no creamed corn so I got out the stick blender. I do have some potatoes so adding those and the evap milk on hand so happy about that for the pièces de résistance. (I added some salt. Couldn't help myself). Simmering now.

It came out very nice. I think it would be even better without the winging it - like with real creamed corn. I maybe should have added some butter and milk to my stick-blender-cream-corn. I was expecting a lot more Basil but it blended into the background. I tried it with Parmesan cheese first bowl and then with sriracha second bowl. I preferred the latter.

Good. I can see the sriracha over the parm. Glad it worked. It's a good pantry recipe to keep in mind.

On list to try...still working through the 12 soups I brought up to PA. But this is a do-able "Mom" dish. Thanks, charley2.

Agree about the sriracha because the one thing that I will vary on this recipe is the sausage - sometimes mild, sometimes hot. Sometimes I just add some red pepper flakes to mild to get it somewhere in between the two.