An Inconvenient Truth - Quick Corn Chowder

The inconvenient truth is that I am waking up every morning with a headache.  I can't be sure if this is because my eyes need to be checked, or because one of my Yorkies sleeps on my head.

Another inconvenient truth is that there is nothing wrong with using convenience foods.  There, I said it and I'm glad.

I've never understood food snobbery, or any other kind of snobbery, for that matter.  My grandmother's favorite convenience food was Campbell's tomato soup.  It shows up in her fabulous cabbage soup and stuffed cabbage, and in a pinch, she could make a "Jewish" spaghetti sauce out of it as well.

She never made green bean casserole with Campbell's cream of mushroom soup, or California dip with Lipton's onion soup mix, but I sure did, and so did most of my cooking friends.  The vast majority of my recipes are "from scratch" but if a convenience food is good, why not use it?  Look at the ingredient list on the back of the box or jar and if you can pronounce everything on it, chances are it's pretty good.

Not every convenience food comes in a red and white can.  Prepared sauces for pasta and proteins, puff pastry, phyllo (filo), tartar and seafood sauces, salad dressings, bread crumbs, stuffing mixes, broths and stocks, cake mixes, pudding mixes, Jell-o, frozen vegetables, canned vegetables (you can't make Ratner's vegetable cutlet without canned vegetables), and on and on.  Hellman's mayonnaise is a convenience food.  So is barbecue sauce and dry pasta.   It's a good time to be a home cook.  And even Martha Stewart uses frozen puff pastry to make her pigs in blanket.

I have no idea where my mother got this recipe.  It's ridiculously good.

1 - 10 ½ ounce can Campbell’s Cream of Potato Soup

1 - 15 ounce can creamed corn

1 soup can half-and-half

1-2 tablespoons butter

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Stir all the ingredients together in a saucepan over medium heat, then top with a lump of butter.  Salt and pepper to taste.