Sweetcorn Chowder Today I have made my seventieth soup from The Soup Book . The recipe is by Celia Brooks Brown and calls for fresh corn on the cob, bay leaves, onion, sage, thyme, carrot, celery, potato, cream cheese, cream and paprika. It always gives me a little thrill when I gather the herbs that I have grown myself! My thyme and sage plants are doing surprisingly well this year and perhaps I'm imagining it, but during cooking they are much more aromatic than pre-packed leaves. The recipe states that the "prep" time for the sweetcorn chowder is just ten minutes. I need to speed up my gathering, washing, peeling and chopping. The chowder was supposed to take thirty minutes to cook, but it wasn't that straightforward. Apart from preparing the vegetables, you then have to strip the corn kernels from the cob and set them aside while you simmer the cobs with the bay leaves. Then you cook the onions, adding the other herbs, carrot, celery and potato. While these a...