Corn and Chanterelle Bisque

I was lucky enough to score some chanterelles at the farmers market on Saturday, from Paul Lagreze. I don't know if he'll have any more this week, but they were divine! They do something really magical here in this soup with the sweet corn and a hint of sherry. This tastes very rich with whole milk, but if you want to up the luxury level even farther, substitute cream for some of the milk.

A word about sherry: if you don't keep a bottle of cooking sherry in your pantry, you should. You can get a bottle of dry sherry suitable for cooking for well under $10 and it keeps pretty much forever.

4 tsp butter
2 medium shallots, minced
1/4 lb chanterelle mushrooms, finely chopped
6-7 ears sweet corn, kernels stripped off
Water and/or stock (chicken or vegetable)
2 cups whole milk
2 Tbsp dry sherry
Salt and pepper to taste

Melt the butter in a soup pot. Add the shallots and chanterelles and saute over medium heat until tender, about 3-4 minutes. Add the corn kernels plus enough water to just cover. Simmer until tender, 5-10 minutes.

Puree the soup using an immersion blender, or do it in batches in a blender, then return to the pot. Puree to whatever degree you like between chunky and smooth. Then stir in the milk and sherry and add salt and pepper to taste.

Serve hot.

Serves 4-6.

Variation: To turn this into a chowder instead of a bisque, add cubed potatoes (new potatoes would be wonderful) and puree only a little, just enough to thicken the soup a little.