What’s Inside: Today, we’re diving into the wonderful world of cooking from food storage. Our recipe for the day? A mouthwatering Mexican Corn Chowder soup mix recipe, made with 100% shelf stable ingredients. This is an excellent meal in jars recipe. It takes just a few minutes to pull all of the ingredients together, and tastes great!
Cooking From Food Storage: Mexican Corn Chowder and Corn Muffins
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Pantry Stuffers Soup Mixes: Using Dehydrated Products
I got this recipe from the book, Pantry Stuffers Soup Mixes: Using Dehydrated Products. It’s a great book, with a lot of fantastic recipes. One thing I love the most about it is that it provides recipes for different serving sizes. So, whether you’re creating meals just for yourself, for a couple, or large family, you’ll know exactly how much of each ingredient to use.
Ingredients
Here are the ingredients to make this delicious Mexican Corn Chowder recipe:
- 1/2 cup dehydrated corn
- 1/2 cup dehydrated potato dices
- 2 TBS dehydrated onions
- 1 t. dehydrated mixed peppers
- 1/4 cup powdered milk
- 2 TBS all-purpose flour
- 1 1/2 t. cumin
- 1/2 t. garlic
- 1 1/2 t. parsley flakes
- 1/4 t. dehydrated jalapeno
- 1 t. chicken bouillon
- 1/4 t. pepper
- 1/2 t. salt
Mother Earth Products
Note that all of the ingredients linked to above are from Mother Earth Products. I love Mother Earth Products because they have good quality, and a great variety of ingredients. On top of that, you can buy dehydrated and freeze dried food in portions as small as two cups, which makes stocking your pantry more affordable, if you need to buy several ingredients.
How to Use this Shelf-Stable Soup Mix
Now let’s get into how to use this Mexican Corn Chowder soup mix recipe.
The first thing to note is that the recipe, as written above, fits perfectly into a pint-size mason jar, and it feeds 2-3 people. If you want 4-6 servings, just double it and store it in a quart jar. There is no need to vacuum seal it, however, if you want to keep it on your shelf long term, then I recommend vacuum sealing. I personally use this handheld vacuum sealer, and these mason jar attachments, both available on Amazon.
The Process of Making the Mexican Corn Chowder
Now let’s get into the process of making this delicious soup!
Step 1: Rehydrate the Soup Mix in Boiling Water
This first step may cause a bit of consternation for those of you who want dinner on the table in 15 minutes. While it’s true that this soup mix is super easy to use, and takes very little time to put together, rehydrating it and cooking it does take a bit of time. The good news is, the time is mostly hands off, and super easy.
First, bring 4 cups of water to a boil in a medium-sized sauce pan. (Note, this is the amount of water that you’ll need for the recipe amounts listed above, that fits into a pint-sized jar, and feeds 2-3 people. If you are doubling the recipe so that it feeds 4-6 people, and fits into a quart-sized jar, then use 8 cups of water.)
Once the water comes to a boil, turn off the heat, and pour the soup mix into the boiling water.
Stir, and Put the Lid On
Stir the soup mix into the hot water until it’s well combined, and then put a lid on to keep in the heat.
Now, this is the part where you have to be a little bit patient. Let the soup mix sit in the hot water for 30 minutes to rehydrate.
Step 2: Cook the Mexican Corn Chowder
After the soup mix has been sitting in the hot water for 30 minutes, remove the lid.
Over medium heat, cook the soup for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.
Note that you may not need to cook the soup for the entire 30 minutes. The main goal at this point is to cook the soup until the potatoes are completely rehydrated.
The soup will thicken as it cooks, since it has flour in it. If you find that it’s becoming too thick before the potatoes soften, stir in a bit of water to thin it out to the desired consistency.
My Verdict on This Soup Mix Recipe
There are a few main factors that I look for before I decide to make a recipe part of my normal food storage plan. Here are the main ones to consider:
- Cost. Especially if you’re looking to store up a large emergency food supply, unless you have unlimited funds, cost is a big consideration.
- Ease of preparation. The amount of work that it takes to put together meals in jars or soup mixes or anything else for my prepper panty is another factor that I consider when it comes to whether or not to make more of something. If the cost is low, but it’s complicated to make, I’m less likely to do it on a consistent or large-scale basis.
- Taste and appearance. There are certain foods that taste good, but look unappetizing. There are other recipes that look great, but don’t taste all that great. overall, I would say that taste is a more important factor when it comes to what you store in your long-term food storage. But appearance is also important.
- Shelf stable. How shelf stable something is is another important factor when it comes whether or not something is worth storing on a large scale.
So now let’s consider how this soup mix recipe stands up in light of the above considerations.
How Much the Soup Mix Costs to Make
When I initially made this soup mix, I did a cost breakdown. However, since I did that, grocery prices have gone up so much, the figures are no longer valid. Also, prices vary so much from one location to another, so that makes it impossible to provide solid numbers.
Having said that, this recipe is very inexpensive to make, particularly if you dehydrate the onions, potatoes, peppers, and corn yourself.
Pro Tip: Use the coupon code SMP to get a 10% discount when you purchase dehydrated onions, potatoes, corn, and peppers from Mother Earth Products.
Ease of Preparation
Thankfully, this soup mix was super easy to prepare. It didn’t take too long to put together the ingredients in a jar, and it would be super fast to make multiple jars of the same soup mix.
Also, while the cooking process is a bit lengthy, it’s super easy.
Taste and Appearance
We really enjoyed the Mexican Corn Chowder. It was very flavorful, while at the same time not overly spicy. This makes it suitable for all members of the family, as well as adults that may enjoy Mexican-inspired food, and yet are unable to handle the heat.
The only thing is that the cumin flavor is pretty strong, so if you’re not a fan of cumin, you may want to substitute chili powder or taco seasoning in place of the cumin.
In terms of appearance, the soup would look a bit bland, if it weren’t for the peppers. The red and green peppers add a nice pot of color to the soup, which improves the appearance.
Shelf Stable
This soup mix recipe is very shelf stable, even without vacuum sealing. None of the ingredients are prone to go bad super-fast in the same way that something like freeze dried or dehydrated meat would. I do still recommend vacuum sealing the soup mix if you want to keep it in your pantry for more than a year.
Conclusion
The bottom line is that I feel that this soup mix recipe is one worth making. It’s easy enough to prepare that you can throw it together each time you want to eat it. But since it fits perfectly into a pint or quart-sized mason jar (depending on your desired serving size), and since it’s so shelf stable, in my opinion, it’s worth making up a few jars at a time.
Pantry Stuffers Soup Mixes: Using Dehydrated Products
I got this recipe from the book, Pantry Stuffers Soup Mixes: Using Dehydrated Products. It’s a great book, with a lot of fantastic recipes. One thing I love the most about it is that it provides recipes for different serving sizes. So, whether you’re creating meals just for yourself, for a couple, or large family, you’ll know exactly how much of each ingredient to use.
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