Chicken Curry Soup

Wait, who's that cupping her soup bowl? Oh right, it's our old friend and roommate KZim, traveling across the county from sunny Berkley to the frozen tundra of the Lower East Side to join us in soup night. Not so much has changed since Kate decided to run away to a place of higher education, golden prospects, and life coaches, well except Zizi cat is enormous... As I write that out I am acutely aware Alayna is going to protest that I delete that line. And I won't.

You know why I won't? Because while everyone ate their warm soup I was forced into manual labor, sanding away a spice rack until my hands bled. I have a welts on my once soft, indoor kid hands to prove it. So now I'm getting my revenge and am telling the whole world, little baby Zizi isn't so little anymore. But I love her more for it. I love fat cats. We all remember blessed Big Boy Snauffer don't we?

So hurray for this soup. Put the word "curry" in a soup title and I think it's going to be a lardy mess of goodness--fatty goodness. This is not that sort of curry soup. There isn't a dairy product to be found- just curry powder. It's tasty and super healthy. So indulge in this non-indulgence. Even Zizi can have a few licks.

Chicken Curry Soup

• roughly chop one large yellow onion and saute in olive oil
• also roughly chop one large sweet potato, three turnips and 5-7 large carrots, to add once the onion is getting translucent.
  
• sprinkle generously with garam masala and curry powder and stir until all veggies are covered
• cover in chicken or veggie broth and bring to a low boil, simmering for about 20 minutes
• add two chopped apples
• in a different pan, cook 3 chicken breasts in olive oil and set aside
• once veggies are all soft, blend then together. add in chicken, and salt, pepper and lime to taste
• serve!

Carrot Coconut

The texture revolution.

This is what I mean, these are the things I've started to do differently. I buy the New York Sunday Times at the store on 25th and 3rd even though I can read it for free online. I drink coffee in a mug which I refill and refill and refill on the long part of my couch and pick apart the paper. I bought a hard covered book (Sherman Alexie, War Dances) at the store. It was new and cost $23. I just re-read all the underlined parts of "For Whom the Bell Tolls," my copy is taped up the spine. I read it in Galicia. I lent it to a boy to read in Galicia. I lent it to a boy to read in Barcelona. I re-read it in Barcelona. I mailed it home on a box that took a ship across the Atlantic.

"There is no such thing as safety. There are so many seeking safety here now that they make a great danger. In seeking safety now you lose all."

I underlined that. But I didn't add any stars on the margin next to it. Which means those sentence were my lowest priority of underlining. I have a structure. Two stars is as high as a sentence can be. I won't tell you what those are though.

I meant to write about something else for this post but then I started looking through books because I was looking for Something. A line or something. And instead I remembered how much I miss the feeling of books. I remember pretty much almost exactly what I was thinking when I underlined everything I have ever underlined. It's a gift. I paged through a Mary Oliver book of poems, and then a Frances Driscoll book of poems, which I don't think is a big name but I found her in a used bookstore in Maine-- which place in Maine, Brunswick? and I cried sitting in the corner reading it because it was sad. And then I probably pitched a tent somewhere.

Alayna and I haven't discussed the texture revolution that thoroughly yet but I know she's part of it, too. She forgot what it felt like to receive mix tapes and then she did in the mail and remembered. She builds pots in her hands. That's a good one.

What do you do to keep texture in your life? Making soup counts, too.

Carrot Coconut Cah-Cah-Cah

• 4-5 garlic cloves chopped in olive oil, saute
• Add 2 shallots, 5 stalks of celery chopped, 1 head of broccoli chopped
• a few generous shakes of garam masala, chili powder and coriander
  
• Add 2-3 large leeks, a "decent" amount of ginger chopped
• 4 small red potatoes, skin on, add a bag of regular carrots chopped
• Pour in a can of coconut milk

Add enough chicken broth to cover the veggies

Bring to boil and then let simmer for about 25 minutes until veggies are soft

Blend!

Alayna and the soup. I cannot smile while spooning soup. We tried. We took 8 pictures. I can't do it.