More Soup, What Can I Say?

So, I’m a total dweeb, seriously. Do people still say dweeb? I’m a dweeb. Whenever people would mention to me in public that they’d seen my food blog, I’d get all embarrassed and feel like a loser. And I decided I wasn’t going to do it because I wanted to be cool. You know.

And then people started asking me what happened to it, and it was way more embarrassing to say that I didn’t want to do it anymore because I wanted to be cool, so fuck it, here’s some soup.

Seven-Veggie Soup

This technically has eight vegetables in it, but Rob said that Seven-Veggie Soup was a catchier name, so let’s go with that. You could use whatever you wanted, really. I had started out intending to make traditional minestrone, or at least what I thought traditional minestrone was, but as it turns out, there are no hard and fast rules to minestrone.

So, here we go. I had some zucchini and the very, very last of the summer squash. It looked a little anemic, but I figured it’d be okay. Dice these both into bite size pieces. Heat some olive oil in the bottom of a big pot, and add a clove or two of minced garlic, and maybe half an onion. Sautee them until they are soft and fragrant. This, incidentally, is the beginning to every good recipe for soup, and also for tomato sauce. I love this method, it just feels so familiar and smells so good. Anyway, enough dweebiness. I added a few shakes of dried oregano. You could use dried basil, or Italian seasoning, or whatever you like. The key to cooking with dried herbs is to add them at the beginning so they have time to release their flavors. When using fresh herbs, add them at the end so they don’t lose all their flavor in cooking.

Throw in your chopped zucchini and squash and stir. I also threw in a diced red pepper at this point, which I thought was really good, but Rob was not sold on. Also, I’d had half a bag of frozen corn leftover from something, and I added that too. Cook about 5 minutes until the veggies are soft, then add a can of crushed tomatoes. The big can. If it had been summer, I’d have pureed some fresh tomatoes, but it’s not, so canned it is. Pour in 2 cans of vegetable broth and bring it to a boil. Once it’s boiling, lower the heat a bit and simmer, covered, for 15-20 minutes.

Add a can of drained white beans. I used navy beans, which prompted me to keep singing that line from that terrible Adam Sandler song that just goes, “navy beans navy beans navy beans!” Clearly you know exactly what I’m talking about. Also add about a ½ a cup of uncooked small pasta. I actually ended up putting more in because I thought it didn’t look like enough, but I was wrong. ½ cup it is. I used ditalini, because that’s what I thought was usually in minestrone. Cook until the pasta is tender, about 10 minutes. Just keep trying it. Once the pasta is tender, throw in a big handful of spinach and let it wilt for a few minutes, then remove the soup from heat. Season with salt and pepper if need be, add a little fresh basil if you want, and serve.

I garnished with freshly grated asiago cheese, because Rob gets antsy if he doesn’t get at least some animal-product in him, but this would certainly be a good vegan soup otherwise.



I wish the picture had come out a bit better, because the soup was definitely more red and vibrant than this, but oh well. Rob says he was pleasantly surprised and went into it timidly, which isn’t surprising because we recently had someone who knows him well convinced that Rob is allergic to vegetables.

Eight hot dogs. Woo!

Soup Season!

Potato-Rosemary Soup

Sorry for the delayed posting, I've been busy sitting on my couch and being fat, post-Thanksgiving.
Anyway.
MMMM soup. Around this time of year, I’m pretty much obsessed with soup. It’s liquid, it’s chunky, it’s WHATEVER YOU WANT IT TO BE.

Anyway, I had made this soup a few weeks ago when Rob went out in the cold to play paintball with his coworkers (yeah-- I don’t know why, either.) and then promptly forgot to write down what I put in it. So I tried to recreate it last night and paid closer attention this time around.

In a large pot, sauté the following in a bit of olive oil:
3 garlic cloves, minced
2 celery ribs, chopped (leaves and all)
1 white onion, chopped (because Rob is so afraid of big chunks of onions, I always puree them before I put them in soup or sauce. It’s actually pretty nice, except that when you go to sauté pureed onion, it will burn your eyes like you wouldn’t believe. Seriously, do NOT lean over that pot.)

Sauté these all for a few minutes until the celery seems tender. Add to this two cans of vegetable broth and 12 small red potatoes, quartered (this is about 2 pounds, I’d guess.)
Cover and let boil, then cook about 15 minutes or until the potatoes are tender.

Once the potatoes are cooked to your liking, take out about 10 of the quartered potato pieces and set them aside. To the soup, stir in a few glugs of balf-and-half (I never said this was fat free, did I?) until the soup begins to turn white/light brown. Ew! It tastes better than it sounds, I promise.

Working in batches if you’re me, or all at once if you’re an awesome person that owns a big food processor, puree the soup until it is a thick consistency. Return to pot and add salt and pepper generously. Simmer for a bit, and add more half-and-half if you want it to be a lighter color, a bit of water for a thinner soup, etc.

Sprinkle the potato pieces you left out with some salt and cut them into smaller chunks. You could either put them back in the soup now, or divide them among the bowls once it’s been served.

Chop a few sprigs worth of rosemary very finely and add it to the soup. I find that rosemary flavor gets weak very quickly when cooked in soup, but if you don’t cook it long enough, it’ll be overbearing. Just keep tasting, you’ll know when it’s ready.

Ladle into bowls and add the remaining potatoes, if you didn’t before. Garnish with a sprig of rosemary (come on, like you’re ever gonna use all the rosemary that comes in that package) and eat.



This soup is awesome with stale-ish bread, oyster crackers, and watching the X-Files on DVD in bed with your loved one. Um, not that that’s what we do. We’re exciting and fun, I swear!

Rob gave it 8 hot dogs. Awesome!

It's Soup:30!

So for a few days there, it really felt like fall in Western PA. But then the temperatures rose again, and I think the high is like 70 today. But no matter, because technically it is fall, and that means I’m making soup.

At Rob’s suggestion, I made clam chowder. I’d never done this before, so I had to read through a few recipes to try to adapt them. Apparently, clam chowder is serious business. I mean it—people in the Northeast are crazy about their clam chowder. Being from Pittsburgh, which some will argue is the Northeast, some will argue is the Midwest, I’m far less concerned. So if this recipe is not “authentic” (and I know it isn’t), don’t complain! This recipe made two very large bowls of soup--we definitely didn't finish them!

Clam Chowder

2 eight-ounce bottles clam juice
about ½ pound red potatoes, unpeeled, cut into bite size pieces
1 tablespoon butter
1 cups chopped white onions
2 stalks of celery, chopped well (including the leaves, they are so good!)
2 garlic cloves, chopped
1 bay leaf
1/4 cup flour
3 six-and-a-half-ounce cans chopped clams, drained, juices reserved
1/2 cups half and half
squirt of Sriracha (see a pattern with this?)
salt n pepa

So, pour the clam juice into a pot and add the potatoes. Bring to a boil and then lower the heat a bit to cook the potatoes—around 10 minutes, depending on how big the potato chunks are. This will make your kitchen smell a bit bad, because let’s face it, clam juice is kind of gross. Remove from heat and set aside.

In another pot, melt the butter. Add the celery, onions, garlic and bay leaf, cook until the veggies are soft (5-7 minutes, maybe?) Stir in the flour slowly and whisk like hell. Don’t let it brown. Cook about 2 minutes, stirring constantly, and then slowly begin adding the reserved juice from the clams. Keep whisking…build those whisking muscles. Try to break up any clumps of flour and veggies. Add the potatoes with the clam juice they were boiled in, half and half, canned clams and the Sriracha. Stir well and allow to simmer, stirring frequently, for 10-15 minutes, just to let it get hot, let the flavors blend and the soup thicken. Be sure to take the bay leaf out, that's a surprise that no one wants. Season chowder with salt and pepper and slurp away.



I served it with a sprinkling of parsley and some sourdough bread. You know what, this was damn good. It would definitely have been better with fresh clams, but when you’re landlocked in the fall, you do what you can.

Rob's review:
Also 9/10 hot dogs!



You know, I'm beginning to think Rob's being overly nice on the giving of hot dogs because he has to live with me. If you'd like to become a hot dog rater, please come over for dinner.