Soups on!

Since soups are a big favorite of mine in the fall, I thought I'd recap soups I've done and those I hope to do in the coming months!

Last week I made a HUGE pot of Pasta e Fagioli ala Rachel Ray, which, although it differs from most of the pasta e fagioli I've seen in restaurants, is my favorite recipe for it. Mine is more like a pasta dish however - I always overdose on the pasta!



Another favorite of mine is Tyler Florence's Corn Chowder. It filled my dutch oven to the brim, and was spectacular. I can only imagine how much better it would have been with fresh corn, yum.




Broccoli-Cheese soup - I got this as part of a recipe exchange, and loved it, but thought I could do better next time, so hopefully this is one of the items I'll get to make again this season.




The soups I am looking forward to making this season:

Black bean and bowtie soup (this is basically black bean vegetable soup with farfalle; one of the ladies at church brought this in a while back and I looooved it)

Homemade chicken noodle soup (did this once, with broth and anelli, but looking to do it again with homemade chicken stock!)

Beef Barley soup (probably won't be a favorite of hubs, but I've always wanted a great, simple recipe for this)


Do any of you, out there in cyber-inter-web-land, have any great soup suggestions? What is your favorite soup for cold weather?

Corn Chowder

My fabulous dinner last night, which turned out ok even though I screwed it up royally.

Corn Chowder, courtesy Tyler Florence


Ingredients

* 2 tablespoons butter I completely forgot this because...
* Extra-virgin olive oil
* 1 onion, diced ...I completely ran out of onions
* 2 garlic cloves, minced
* 6 sprigs fresh thyme, leaves only I killed my thyme so I used dried
* 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
* 6 cups canned vegetable stock I used 4c veg stock and 2c chicken
* 2 cups heavy cream
* 2 Idaho potatoes, peeled and diced
* 6 ears corn I used frozen corn, about 2 16oz bags
* Salt and freshly ground black pepper
* 1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley leaves

Directions

Heat the butter and 1 tablespoon olive oil in a soup pot over medium heat. Add the onion, garlic, and thyme and cook until the vegetables are good and soft, 8 to 10 minutes. Dust the vegetables with flour and stir to coat everything well. Pour in the vegetable stock and bring to a boil. Add the cream and the potatoes, bring to a boil and boil hard for about 7 minutes, until the potatoes break down (this will help to thicken the soup and give it a good texture).

Cut the corn kernels off the cob and add to the soup. Season with salt and pepper and simmer until the corn is soft, about 10 to 12 minutes. Stir in the parsley and give it another little drink of olive oil. Ladle the soup into bowls and serve.

Upon opening my cream, I found a lovely pudding-type blob on top. I smelled the cream, and it smelled like cream... so I poured it into a strainer and tasted it... then it occurred to me, I don't know what cream should taste like. But it didn't taste bad, so I added it to the soup minus the blob. Tee hee hee.


Cookin' in my new Paula Deen dutch oven:


I heart my PD pot.


yum, soup completed, with oyster crackers.


The Hubs was making fun of me taking pictures, but I had to take this one because he put so many damn crackers in it looked like cereal.
Later, he said, "Is this what corn chowder is supposed to look like? Creamy?"...uh, it's chowder. What else does it look like? Well it didn't look like his Wawa corn chowder, but too bad... it was homemade and darn good. He ate two bowls.

Halloween!!! (Chili)

OK, I'm finally getting to it. For Hday this year we had a work party where we brought in dishes. We had contests for the tastiest and scariest food. Since we don't have a ton of cooks, I usually bring a main dish. This time, chili. I decided to use the recipe from the Brown Eyed Baker's blog. She makes it look so easy!

Being that my schedule was like this:
Tuesday: work, then work
Wednesday: recipe exchange dinner, prep pumpkin muffins, bake pumpkin muffins
Thursday: work, work, pumpkin muffins, frost pumpkin muffins, prep chili
Friday: (morning) brown meat for chili, throw stuff in crock pot, carry 30lbs of stuff to work, work, scurry home, carve my pumpkins, decorate house, hand out candy (and maybe eat some dinner)

I decided to assemble said chili the night before, cutting veg and opening can and dumping everything into a crock pot (which mom bought me the day before, I was complaining, and she got me a crock pot. I heart mom) which worked beautifully. I browned the meat the morning of, mixed, set on high, and it was great by noon. Hubs LOVED this. I didn't tell him it came from the crock pot. He wouldn't eat it.

Chili
(Adapted from Recipezaar) ~ via Brown Eyed Baker's blog

2 lbs ground beef
1 (29 ounce) can tomato sauce
1 (15 ounce) can kidney beans (with liquid)
2 (15 ounce) cans pinto beans (with liquid) Cat used black beans because the hubs likes.
1 medium onion, diced
1 green pepper, diced
1 stalk celery, diced Did not use, it's so uneconomical to buy a whole freaking thing of celery just for one stalk.
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 tablespoon chili powder
1 teaspoon black pepper
2 teaspoons salt
2 cups water

1. Brown ground beef in a large pot (or a pan, so that you can shove everything in a crock pot) over medium heat.

2. Drain off the fat.

3. Combine the beef plus all the remaining ingredients, and bring to a simmer over low heat.

4. Cook, stirring every 15 minutes, for 2 to 3 hours.


Yay for Chili!! Sadly, all was eaten before I could get a picture. Just pretend.

Recipe Exchange: 3 Cheese Broccoli Soup

I made my entry for the latest recipe exchange last Wednesday, when I was also busy prepping for Halloween goings on. It was sooooo good. I do have to admit I couldn't find all of the cheeses from Wisconsin, so I just picked up the cheeses from as close as I could get (one was from Ohio, it's still midwest!)

Without further adieu:

Taste of Wisconsin Three Cheese Broccoli Soup

Ingredients:
6 Tbsp. butter
1/3 C. flour
1/4 tsp. garlic powder
1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg
1/8 tsp. ground white pepper
dash ground thyme
1 - 13 3/4 ounce can chicken broth
1 C. milk
3 C. bite-size broccoli florets (I used fresh broccoli, took me fo-eva to cut the sucker up)
1 C. whipping cream
1/4 tsp. Worcestershire sauce
1/8 tsp. hot pepper sauce
1 C. (4 ounces) shredded Wisconsin Cheddar Cheese
1/2 C. (2 ounces) shredded Wisconsin-Style Havarti Cheese
1/2 C. (2 ounces) shredded Wisconsin Swiss Cheese

Preparation:
Melt butter in 3-quart saucepan over low heat. Blend in flour and seasonings. Gradually add broth and milk; cook, stirring constantly, until thickened. Stir in broccoli; simmer 10 minutes. Remove from heat; stir in cream, Worcestershire sauce and hot pepper sauce. Add cheeses; stir until melted. Makes 6 - 3/4 cup servings.

It turned out very well, even though I am the worst with melting cheese into any sort of roux with milk. I've determined I don't get the milk hot enough before adding. I am impatient. Natch.