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A typically chunky chowder conjures images of wind and rain-battered fishing boats. But there’s not a clam in sight for this one! Swap out the traditional seafood for sausage and sink into a steaming bowl of hot creamy potato chowder.
What goes better with soup than homemade bread? Try making your own with our recipe Sourdough Bread for Beginners.
Sausage is a perfect alternative to seafood in a chowder. Not only is it more affordable, it’s easier to work with in the kitchen for less ambitious cooks. You can’t go wrong!
There are so many sausages to choose from out there, so you can really tailor this soup to your family’s taste. You could go for a simple table-pleasing pork and leek, or experiment with a paprika-spiced sausage. If you like it, smoked sausage would offer a wintry and warming flavour.
Creamy Potato Soup
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. The key to any good potato soup is the humble potato itself. Russet potatoes, or Maris Piper (UK) will naturally give the soup a more creamy texture. If you also want a firmer chunk, include a waxy potato too.
Using half and half will give you the best of both worlds. I don’t do it in this recipe but you can blend half the potato chowder so you have a mix of smooth soup and bite-sized potato pieces.
What is Chowder?
Typical of the North Eastern United States and Atlantic Canada, this potato soup is characterised by a rich creamy base and hearty chunks of potato, and usually seafood or vegetables. A good example of it is fish chowder or corn chowder.
The potato chowder recipe could be found in European fishing communities as far back as the 16th century. But don’t let history confine you. I’m breaking the seafood rules with sausage while staying true to the potato.
Recipe Tips and Notes
- I use sausage because I like the flavour, but feel free to substitute with bacon. Bacon will add a smoky depth which is equally delicious.
- The long, black grains of wild rice offer a striking contrast in this creamy potato soup. But brown rice or pearl barley are accessible and affordable alternatives that will still provide bite.
- Flour or corn flour can be used to thicken the soup. The latter will make the soup gluten-free.
- You could try using sweet potatoes instead of regular ones if you prefer them, or have them to use up. They also cook quicker so a helpful time-saver if needed!
- To make this soup creamy you can use dairy cream or plant based substitute like soya cream.
- Finally, taste your soup! You may want to add more salt.
Storage and Leftovers
Don’t be tempted to big-batch and freeze this particular soup recipe. Potatoes tend not to freeze well and can become grainy when thawed.
Eat this one on the day when it’s come straight from the stovetop and steaming to the table. Any leftovers can be refrigerated and used in 2-3 days.
More Creamy Soup Recipes
- Creamy Chicken Bacon Gnocchi Soup
- Curried Parsnip Soup
- Creamy Chicken Wild Rice Soup
- Cauliflower Cheese Soup
Potato and Sausage Chowder
Equipment
- This is an affiliate link.Soup pot
Ingredients
- 1 tbsp This is an affiliate link.olive oil
- 400g(6) sausages, any flavour
- 1 onion, chopped
- 2 stalks celery, sliced
- 2 carrots, cliced
- 2 cloves garlic
- 1/2 tsp dried thyme
- 3 tbsp plain/all purpose flour
- 1 litre/4 cups chicken or vegetable stock
- 2 This is an affiliate link.bay leaves
- 100g/1/2 cup wild rice
- 3 potatoes, medium, peeled and cut into chunks
- 375ml/1 1/2 cups single/light cream or half and half
- salt to taste
Instructions
- Heat the oil in a soup pot. Remove the sausage from the casing, add to the pot, break up the sausage with a spatula and fry until golden on the outside and cooked all the way through, then remove to a separate plate.(If your sausage is very fatty, remove the excess fat but leave 2 tbsp in the pot)
- To the same pot, add the chopped onion, celery and sliced carrot and cook for 10 minutes over low heat, then add minced garlic and thyme, cook for 30 seconds longer. Sprinkle the flour all over and combine with the fat until it turns into a paste, continue cooking for a couple of minutes, then bring the sausage back in.
- Pour a bit of the chicken stock in and stir until well combined with the roux, then pour in the rest, add 2 bay leaves and wild rice, bring to a simmer and cook over low to medium heat for 30 minutes, then add the cubed potatoes and cook for 15 minutes longer until the wild rice and the potatoes are cooked. Then pour in the cream and season with salt and pepper, allow the cream to warm through, then take off the heat. Serve with chopped fresh parsley.
Notes
- I use sausage because I like the flavour, but feel free to substitute with bacon. Bacon will add a smoky depth which is equally delicious.
- The long, black grains of wild rice offer a striking contrast in this creamy potato soup. But brown rice or pearl barley are accessible and affordable alternatives that will still provide bite.
- Flour or corn flour can be used to thicken the soup. The latter will make the soup gluten-free.
- You could try using sweet potatoes instead of regular ones if you prefer them, or have them to use up. They also cook quicker so a helpful time-saver if needed!
- To make this soup creamy you can use dairy cream or plant based substitute like soya cream.
- Finally, taste your soup! You may want to add more salt.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Question: is there a way to make it dairy free? Iโm wondering if coconut or soy milk might work? This recipe looks outstanding!
Yes, there is. I actually wrote about it in Recipe Tips and Notes if you scroll up. I often use either soy cream or oat cream as both my son and I are lactose intolerant. I would not recommend coconut milk; the texture is great but the flavour is all wrong for this soup.
Hi! I havenโt tried this yet but am dying to! Would brown rice work instead of wild rice?
Absolutely! Enjoy.
I made the Potato and Sausage Chowder last night for dinner and everyone loved it!!! I’ll definitely be making it again. I used spicy ground sausage (because that’s what I had on hand), but besides that followed the recipe exactly how it’s written. Thanks for sharing!
Thanks for your review, Michelle! I love the addition of spicy sausage here. I think Chorizo would work so well too.
The flavour of the soup “would” have been good but it was marred by the taste of the very expensive wild rice scorched to the bottom of the pot. A less experienced cook in the house, who hadn’t worked with wild rice before, followed the instructions to the letter.
The recipe “does” taste good, but there are no temperature suggestions for the various ingredient stages. No suggestions of how long to boil vs simmer. So using high heat, he brought it to a boil…and parked it there. You can imagine the rest.
My suggestion would be to just make a couple of edits about times and temperatures, whether to stir and how often. And other recipes I have seen of this type of soup precook the rice and add it at the end with the cream.
Hi Peter, so you didn’t actually have a personal experience making this soup yet you are rating it? The reality of learning how to cook is making basic mistakes like not stirring the soup and burning it, which is exactly what happened here. It sounds like the “less experienced cook” in your house could benefit from a few helpful tips from a more experienced cook like yourself but of course blaming the recipe is much easier.
I would also like to agree that a recipe should kindly add in the temperature recommended for cooking for those of us who don’t have as much experience and do follow recipes to a T.
Have you read the recipe, Julia? Every bit of instruction has as much detail as you can possibly need to make a soup. I cannot add temperature for stove top instructions. Only oven recipes have exact temperatures. The best I can do is low, medium or high, all of which are included in the recipe.
I completely disagree. Everything you need to make this recipe a success is in there. If you donโt know the difference between a simmer and a rolling boil, you should take some classes instead of poorly rating something that was entirely your fault. Just finished my batch and it was perfect!
This recipe is definitely a keeper. I didn’t have any carrots on hand, so I substitued red chili peppers, yellow chili peppers and orange chili peppers. I also used Aleppo pepper instead of black pepper, and I used Andouille sausage. The soup was just a bit spicy, and very colorful and flavorful. This is a great soup for fall or winter.
I am thrilled you enjoyed your creation, Bob!
I made this last night for dinner with friends and it was a huge hit. Probably not a Summer dish but I could not wait for Fall. Give this a try, I have already had requests to make it again.
So glad you enjoyed it!
The flavor of this was really yummy. I needed to add extra chicken broth with the rice, and needed to cook it longer because it wasn’t quite done at the end. My husband said it was a keeper!
Couple things missing for folks that donโt make a lot of chowder. Do I cover and cook for 30 minutes/then 15 minutes? Donโt forget to remove the bay leaves.
If the instructions don’t specify to cover the pot, this usually means you don’t need to do that, otherwise I would’ve have added that specific instruction. The reason you don’t want to cover is because after adding the roux to the liquid it needs to thicken. Covering with a lid will create condensation and it will take longer to come to the right consistency. Definitely don’t eat the bay leaves, I thought it was common knowledge.
Very good, but I think either 1/2 the amount of sausage, or double on the other ingredients, would be better! Very sausage heavy.
Made this last night with mild Italian sausage-delicious! Thank you!
I am thrilled you enjoyed it, Joan!