Serves 6 to 8
Total time: 35 minutes (not including soaking time for cashews)
Active time: 15 minutes
Photo by Vanessa Rees
This is for all you fishheads out there. A mix of mushrooms stand in for the clams to create a super satisfying chewiness, while some chopped up nori give this chowder a true taste of the sea. It’s thick and creamy and loaded with the finer things, like potatoes and carrots. Crumble some saltines over the top and you’ll be able to hear the Atlantic ocean lapping at your feet. For authenticity, make sure to serve this while talking like a character from a Stephen King movie.
Hope you love the video! Please read more about “Make It Vegan”, my new video series!
Notes
~How fishy do you like it? Nori is pretty mild as far as seaweeds go, but the potency varies depending on the brand, and how fresh the nori is. Start with one sheet, then taste after everything is added at the end. If you think it needs more sea, you can still add another chopped up sheet. Just mix it in and let the flavor meld, off the heat, for about 10 miuntes.
~If your nori is really fresh, you don’t even have to chop it (as evidenced in the video), simply crumble it right into the pot.
~To efficiently chop nori, it works to chiffonade it. That means roll up and slice! So tightly roll up your nori sheet like a cigar, and thinly slice. Then run your knife over the curled up bunches to get them into even smaller pieces.
~If you’d like it even more chewy and you have a million dollars to spend on fungi, then go ahead and replace all of the white mushrooms with shiitake.
Ingredients
1 cup cashews, soaked for at least 2 hours
2 cups vegetable broth
4 teaspoons organic cornstarch
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 large yellow onion, diced medium
2 medium carrots, peeled, sliced into 1/4 inch thick half moons
3 stalks celery, sliced 1/4 inch thick
4 oz shiitake mushrooms, thinly sliced
8 oz white button mushrooms, sliced 1/4 inch thick
2 russet potatoes, peeled and cut into 3/4 inch chunks
3/4 teaspoon salt, more to taste
Fresh black pepper
1 to 2 nori sheets, finely chopped (see note above)
3 cups vegetable broth
2 tablespoons tomato paste 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
Optional: fresh chopped parsley or chives for garnish
Saltines for crushing over the top
Directions
Preheat a 4 quart pot over medium heat. Saute onion and carrots in the olive oil with a pinch of salt, for about 10 minutes, until carrots are softened.
In the meantime, we’ll make the cashew cream. Drain the cashews and add them to the blender along with the vegetable broth and cornstarch. Blend like crazy, until smooth. This can take anywhere from one to five minutes depending on your machine. Scrape down the sides with a rubber spatula every now and again to make sure you get everything.
Back to the soup. Add mushrooms and celery. Cook briefly, for about 3 minutes, just until mushrooms are softened. You want them to keep their texture.
Add the potatoes, salt, pepper, nori and vegetable broth. Cover and bring to a boil. Once boiling reduce heat to a simmer. Cook for 10 to 15 minutes, or until potatoes are tender. Be careful to keep a close eye so as not to overcook them or they will turn into mush.
Stir in the cashew cream mixture, and gently heat, uncovered, for about 7 minutes, until nicely thickened. Add the tomato paste and lemon juice and taste for salt and seasoning. Add a little extra water if it seems too thick. Serve garnished with parsley or chives, if you like, and a few saltine crackers. A wedge of lemon looks pretty, too.
I love the video. We have a nut allergy in our house. I was thinking about using coconut milk for cream, but wondering about the proportions. Can you help me out? Is the goal 2 cups of cream? Thanks!
Can’t wait to try. I’ve made another version with Oyster Mushrooms and it was delish.
if i didn’t already love you, that kelley deal song would have made it so. great video!
You are hilarious!
I watched this to hear you talk like Ben Affleck. 🙁 C’mon whatcha doin’ heah?
Enjoyed.
You could also add kombu to flavor the base and then remove for serving.
I am allergic to mushrooms. Is there anything you can recommend as a replacement?
Made this tonight, it was awesome! Thanks for the recipe 🙂
Love it. The video that is. It is perfect soup weather, so I am souper (heh) excited to try it this weekend.
Made this tonight and it is amazing! I use arrowroot pink place of cornstarch as a rule, and loved the way it thickened up. We had our first snow today here at 7,000 ft., so this was great welcome to Winter comfort food.
Loved it, and love all of your recipes! Thank you for sharing!! 😀
This is wicked delicious! I didn’t change a single thing and it brought back happy memories. Thanks.
I just made this and it’s FANTASTIC!! I’ve never had actual clam chowder but that’s not important haha. Thanks so much for the wonderful recipe (:
this is SO YUMMY! best chowder i’ve ever had! had to resist a third bowl. allergic to cashews so substituted blanched peeled almonds and it was great. also great b/c gluten issued household so it was perfect, going to make this a lot this winter! thanks Isa!!!!
Made this tonight…it was awesome! Didn’t make any changes, and I was amazed that it actually tasted just like I remember clam chowder tasting! The texture was right on as well, think and creamy. I don’t know how you did it, but if I had had it at a restaurant, I would have double checked with the chef that it wasn’t actually clams and cream.
Sounds delish. Is this recipe in any of your cookbooks?
Made this tonight. I loved the fact that these ingredients are all usually on hand (in my house, at least). It’s great, especially if you can be patient enough to let it sit for a bit for the flavors to mingle. I’m thinking maybe lunch tomorrow as well…
This is so very good. We’re enjoying it very much here, best chowdah evah!
Will definitely be making this again and again. It’s really excellent with oyster crackers. 🙂
Thank you for the delicious chowdah recipe!! I just made it, and it’s *fantastic!* The extra sheet of nori made it awesome! I also used some dried mushrooms, because they’re chewier in soups.
Wow, what an awesome recipe! We followed it exactly, and subbed shitaake mushrooms for white. The flavor was complex and fantastic, and it came together quickly. Thanks, Isa!
This is so so good! I wanted more of the seaweed flavor, so I added some dulse which was awesome.
I literally just finished a big bowl of this chowder, and I love it! I usually tweak recipes, but I followed this one exactly and it came out amazing. I’ll be making this a lot this winter
Ok! Officially… I have made the chowda… um… first off YUM… i mean YUMMMMM… second off… instead of tomato paste, I threw in the 1/3 – 1/2 c of white wine that I had left over from a get-together, last night. I also added dried tarragon (fresh would have taken it to a whole other place), AND garnished with a shot of truffle oil. Oh…. I’m in deep, deep trouble. Thank you so much Isa!!!
I’m so pumped about the videos. You’re ridiculous. That three minutes beats anything I’ve ever seen on foodnetwork.
Too kind, thank you.
We made this two days ago and loved it.
So of course when we made again the next night we doubled it. It is fabulous, easy, and definitely our new favorite soup.
I just made this (I used all baby Bellas.) It came out amazing.
Can you freeze this? How long does it keep in a container after making it?
It’s such a large amount of soup, I don’t know how I’ll get through it before it goes ‘bad’….
Freeze it!
This looks great – but I dislike seafood tastes (I know, right? What am I doing even reading this recipe?) – if I leave out the nori, will this still be tasty? I love mushrooms so much, and I would love to have a hot, creamy soup for the colder weather. What do you guys think?
Yeah, it’ll be yummy. Like a cream of mushroom potato soup!
I am eating this right now. I’m not exaggerating when I say this is hand’s down the best homemade soup I have ever had. The thickness is perfect and it’s so creamy and comforting. Thank you Isa, this will be in regular rotation all fall/winter.
Delicious. I accidentally added the cashew broth mixture too soon but it still came out amazing. Thanks so much and great video.
Hi – sorry for the random question but many recipes call for fresh lemon so I try to keep fresh lemons on-hand but they go bad before I use them. Any good tips for keeping lemons from going bad? Thanks!
Well, lemon juice is fine! As long as it’s not from concentrate. Just check the bottle.
I just made the soup and it is so good! I am waiting for my family to get home to eat it and I literally had to leave the room so I would stop sneaking tastes of it.
Love the videos! Like a little espresso shot of a cooking show. I hope you keep going with them. (Hear that, Breville?)
Can’t wait to make the glam chowdah.
After watching the videos when you first posted them, my 8yo vegan first begged me to buy the cookbook and then to get cooking. This was my dh’s first request and it was fantastic! My mushroom hating children loved it. I thought it was all of the things I liked about the omni version without the thing that I hated (the clams). Yum, yum, yum!
This soup! I’ve never had real clam chowder before and always thought it was pretty gross. I like mushrooms ok, but only in small quantities, and definitely never as the main attraction, especially not in a soup when their true texture is the point of them. I made this mostly for my husband, but turns out it’s one of the best soups I’ve ever had, and I guess I love clam chowder. Well, glam chowder. It’s magic! And crazy delicious.
Oh wow. I don’t know what possessed me to make this. I’m from Australia and had never heard of clam chowder. I’ve never had chowder OR clams, let alone both together. I had no idea what to expect so I followed the recipe absolutely to a T – no crazy substitutions or modifications. And my god it’s delicious. I had all the ingredients bar the mushrooms so it was cheap as chips to make, and it’s so incredibly luxurious for basically a pantry-staple recipe. Amazinggggg.
Also! I had to come back to add that my husband, my meat eating, seafood loving, adores new england clam chowder husband, said that this is the best chowder he’s ever had. Including over the place we got to in cape cod every year on vacation, which previously held the spot of his favorite clam chowder. He said the thing he sometimes dislikes about clam chowder is when it gets too overly fatty tasting, and this one eliminated that problem and was just amazing and delicious. Win!
Woo hoo! My book arrived. Awesome
You are a mad genius. I’m an omnivore who doesn’t cook meat and doesn’t love dairy so this was great for me, but it absolutely made my 10-year vegetarian boyfriend’s day. He used to love clam chowder in the fall and he was just beside himself with cracker-crumbling happiness at dinner last night. Definitely a repeater, next time with jackfruit crabcakes!
Applause! The whole family loved this – including two teenagers (“This hits the spot!” “It’s a keeper!”) and a 12-year-old who doesn’t like mushrooms (empty bowl, no comment). Well sorta this soup. Alas no nori, so I just did it up as a potato soup. Cashew cream is my new secret soup weapon. Hurrah!
Made this but used kombu broth and added Bragg’s kelp seasoning blend cause I love me some fishy flavour.
So, so good. And a great fake for seafood chowder. Very satisfying.
I’m German andI never had a “proper” New England clam chowder. Just made this tonight and this stuff is freakin’ awesome. The cashew cream is just genius. LOVE LOVE LOVE it!
Plus the videos are simply DA BOMB.
If you are allergic to mushrooms (such as myself), I made this chowder with pressed, frozen, tofu (that I baked for 20 min in a 400 degree oven). It added that lovely, chewy texture for the clams.
I thought the soup was amazingly good. However, I found the liquid proportions to be a bit off. I added an extra cup of broth, and might even add 2 extra cups the next time I make this recipe. The broth quantity as in the recipe would barely cover my veggies (I followed everything exactly).
I need to reiterate, THIS SOUP IS AMAZINGLY DELICIOUS.
Well, mushrooms release moisture and tofu absorbs it, so that could account for some of the moisture issues.
Love these new videos Isa!! Mmm… Now I want chowder!
~K
Ps I did the food styling for this one too! :-))
Oh my goodness oh my goodness oh my goodness this is table-flippin’ good!
Just finished making and am eating this now. Wow, really good. I under cooked the potatoes b/c I was afraid of making mooshy potatoes. I’ll probably make it again this weekend though to fix my mistake!
Thanks for yet another delicous meal.
This is really “wicked awesome” soup. Never would have thought to use the nori. Thanks so much for your recipes.
Hubby has a MAJOR clam allergy and we are newbies to the vegan world. Isa- this is AMAZING! Even our 11 year old son was shoveling it down. Between bites he was saying “you’re definitely making this again right?” It tastes better than clam chowder any day. Thanks a million