Three Soup Sunday

The air is getting crisp, the sweaters are being brought out, and the farmer's markets are stuffed with brightly colored gourds, apples, pears, and jarred goods. It's the beginning of fall! In the fall, like most people, I'm attracted to spicy scents, warm liquids, and rich comfort foods. Thus why I spent Sunday making three different soups: carrot with fresh ginger, roasted red pepper, and beet and fennel.

Carrot and Fresh Ginger Soup

Ingredients
7 cups chicken, or vegetable stock
2 pounds fresh carrots, peeled and chopped
1 large sweet potato, peeled and cubed

1 yellow onion, chopped
4 stalks celery, chopped
4 tablespoons butter
1 (3-inch) piece fresh ginger root, peeled and grated
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/2 pint heavy cream (optional)

I found this recipe on foodnetwork.com but I made some changes. The original recipe called for 3 leeks instead of 1 onion. I've made the soup both ways, and I can't tell the difference and leeks are expensive and a pain to clean. I also use vegetable stock with this recipe and I think that allows the carrots to be front and center instead of sharing the spotlight with chicken. Also, the time before this that I made this soup I managed to clog up our pipes so badly with the carrot peelings that my husband had to take apart the kitchen plumbing. Now I use baby carrots and viola, no peeling and no cussing pissed off husband covered in water, God knows what, and carrot peels.

Peel and chop all of your veggies into one inch cubes or so and saute with 2 tablespoons of the butter in a large skillet with salt and nutmeg until veggies are softening and acquire some color. I actually had to use two large skillets, there are so many veggies and after 10 minutes to get some color on the veggies, I put the lids on to aid in softening for another 10 minutes. Add your grated ginger at the end and don't stir it around because it always falls to the bottom of the skillet and burns, so I just leave it on top for a couple minutes. Bring stock to a strong simmer in a large stock pot. Add veggies and simmer for 30 minutes or until veggies are really really soft. Allow this to cool and then transfer the soup to a blender. Now I know what you are thinking. "Why should I allow this to cool? I'll just be careful." Okay, this stuff is napalm right now. Imagine sloshing it over the sides onto your hands, the sweet potatoes sticking to your skin...ow! Plus, half the time I blend stuff, it overflows. This is not the time to see how much pick up your Bounty paper towels actually has. Okay, so we all together on that 'let it cool' bit? Good. Once you've blended this stuff in batches (it won't all fit in the blender together), mix it back together in your stock pot and add salt and pepper to taste. Serve with a splash of heavy cream.

I freakin' love this soup. I've made it at least 5 times now. It's actually really easy-saute, simmer, blend. It also freezes perfectly, just leave the cream out until you've thawed it and are ready to eat. It's also good without the cream if you are out, but who ever is without heavy cream in their fridge?! Certainly not I! Also, this is a fantastic homemade Soup-At-Hand. Because it is blended, you can simply drink it on the go!

Roasted Red Pepper Soup

Ingredients:

4 red peppers, seeded and chopped

1 yellow or white onion, chopped

2 large carrots or 10 baby carrots, peeled and chopped

4 stalks of celery, chopped

1-3 tablespoons olive oil

1 can crushed tomatoes

2 cups chicken stock or veggie stock

2 tablespoons basil

2 ounces vodka or 1/4 cup dry white wine

pinch red pepper flake

salt to taste

1 pint heavy cream (optional)

Heat your oven to 400 degrees and line a 12X8 cake pan in foil. Toss in your red peppers, onion, carrots, and celery and drizzle with olive oil and a sprinkle of salt. Toss to coat. Roast veggies for 45 minutes. Add the canned tomatoes and roast for another 15-30 minutes. Veggies should look soft and have some brown around the edges. Remove the veggies and add them to a large stock pot and heavy over medium heat. Add the vodka or wine CAREFULLY. (Whenever adding something with an alcohol content, be aware that shit is flammable, and the more alcohol content you have, the higher the risk of a flame up. So, if you are cooking on gas, turn off the fire until the alcohol is safely in the stock pot. Always keep a fire extinguisher around and always keep the lid of the pot around for quick flame snuffing. Just remember to be smart enough to keep yourself off of the msnbc website..."Woman Lights Self On Fire Making Soup!" Not a good way to get your 15 minutes of fame.) Allow to simmer for a couple minutes. Add the stock and the red pepper flake. If you like spicy soup, add a little more, if you like mild soup, add a little less. Take the pot off the heat and allow to cool before transferring to the blender. Toss your basil into the bottom of the blender and pour in the soup. Blend until smooth. Add salt to taste. Serve with a splash of cream.

I'd just like to note that I made this recipe all on my own. Yep. It's a Linda Original and it is damned good. Best roasted red pepper soup I've ever had, if I say so myself. And I do say so myself because it's my blog and that's the point of blogging.

Beet and Fennel Soup

Ingredients
3 medium beets
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 large onions, sliced
1/4 teaspoon fennel seeds
1 large fennel bulbs (sometimes called anise), sliced thin

1/4 cup water
2 cups chicken broth
1/4 cup apple juice or apple cider

Peel the beets and wrap in foil and bake at 400 degrees for about an hour and a half. Take out and allow to cool to the touch, then chop.

Slice onions and cook with the vegetable oil and fennel seeds in a large stock pot over medium high heat until onions start to soften, about 5-10 minutes. Add sliced fennel bulbs and water and cook covered until fennel is very soft 15-20 minutes, stirring often. Add the stock and the beets and simmer uncovered for 15 minutes and add the apple cider. Allow to cool and then transfer to a blender and blend until smooth. Serve with an optional splash of cream.

I got this recipe on foodnetwork.com but I made some changes. I used apple cider instead of orange juice and I cut down the portions because, damnit, one bulb of fennel was $3.50 and the original recipe called for THREE! I don't have $10 to put into one ingredient!

Okay, so I don't like beets. I made that clear in a past posting but beets are So Pretty! The color is gorgeous, deep rich red so dark it's practically purple. They are the jewels of the veggie world! So this was my final try to like beets. I like fennel. I like apple cider and onions and every other ingredient. So the verdict...ehhhhhhh. It's okay. The soup is just okay. If you like beets, I bet you'll love this soup. It's a little sweet to me but I think it'd be a delightful starter for a meal. A cup of beet and fennel soup with a splash of cream, yum. But I doubt I'll make it again for myself.

So there you have it, three soup Sunday. What are your favorite soups?

Quick Tip

It's tomato season!!! Very little excites me more than tomato season-except maybe the idea of a threesome with Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart-but I digress.

As noted before, I'm busy busy busy. Refinishing floors, play practice, work etc. Food remains a high priority for me and I've had to get really creative to eat well because all of my cookware is packed in a POD on my front lawn. It's terrible. I miss my tongs! Yet nothing will stop me from enjoy tomato season. NOTHING! Here is a nice little tip for a lunch salad. In the morning, slice some tomatoes into bite size pieces (I really like using cherry tomatoes and cutting them in half for this application) and place in a small plastic baggie. Add a tablespoon of olive oil and salt and pepper to taste. Pack up some salad greens into a Tupperware container. By lunch, the salt will have pulled some of the tomato juice from the tomatoes, creating a lovely little tomatoy-olive olivey syrup in the bottom of the baggie. Pour the tomatoes and the syrup over your greens. Enjoy!

I love the simplicity of greens, tomatoes, salt, pepper, and olive oil, but if you like a few more flavors, add some of your favorite herbs- rosemary would be nice, and/or some vinegar of choice to the marinade.

Since it is tomato season, I'll also give you my aunt's recipe for oven roasted tomatoes. I use this every time I have too many tomatoes and I need to get them into storage.

Oven Roasted Tomatoes

8-15 medium sized tomatoes, cut into chunks and lightly squeezed over the sink to remove most of the seeds and some of the juice

1 onion, sliced

4 cloves garlic, minced

2 tablespoons olive oil

salt and pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 315 degrees. Toss all of the above into an 8X12 casserole dish, stir to combine and evenly distribute. Bake 2 hours or until a good deal of the juice has cooked out and the tips of the veggies are slightly darker. Allow to cool. Pour into a freezer bag and label and freeze.

You can add any flavors you like to this. Toss in a red pepper! Add basil! More onion? Less garlic? No problem. This is a customizable recipe if ever there was one. Also, you might like it baked longer or shorter, experiment with temperatures if you like. It's easy easy easy.

During the winter, I mainly use this as a sauce for pasta. I'm sure it would be good in chili, stuffing for meat, spooned over chicken...the sky is the limit.