Asparagus and Pea Soup

Yup, that there is a bowl of spring if I ever did see one. This Monday Alayna and I had a soup party. Friends as far as Vermont came for a bowl of blended vegetables and artichoke leaves, or rather, another vehicle to melted butter. "People ask me, what's my favorite food? And I always say lobster of course," Alayna tells the group. "But I really just mean butter."

P.J. might have said it best- "Peas are so hot right now." Peas ARE hot right now. Do you guys utilize a pack of frozen peas as often as you should? Those things are like popcorn. I love when they are still a little bit frozen in the center so they sort of burst in your mouth like a veggie-gusher. I swear, that tastes good.

If you live in NYC, which you probably don't because my Google Analytics say you're more likely to live in Canada or Dubai, you'd know it's been a hot week. Probably not as hot as Dubai right far flung soupettes? This is a great soup warm but I can imagine would be wonderful cold with a dollop of yogurt. Okay friends, enjoy!

Asparagus and Pea Soup

• in a medium saucepan, put 4 chopped medium red potatoes in water to boil and take a bag of peas out to thaw. you don't really have to thaw them if it's warm enough outside that they'll melt (they also make a delicious cooling snack in the meantime)
  
• chop and saute one large yellow in olive oil on medium low heat
  
• add 3-4 leeks, white part only, also chopped and half a bag of baby carrots (or 2-3 large carrots)
• cook covered until onions are translucent
• add two bunches of asparagus, also chopped, bring heat up some and cook covered
  
• when asparagus is bright green, add the thawed peas, and min
• when asparagus is easy to poke through with a fork (about five minutes) add potatoes in their water, a handful of parsley and top off with as much more as you need, adding vegan bouillon
• voila! vegan soup

Delicious artichokes

• cut the stems off your artichokes
• cover with cold water and bring to a low boil
• boil for 35-45 minutes.. when they are done, you should be able to easily poke through the bottom with a fork and pull leaves out of the center
• drain and serve with melted garlic butter (microwaved or stove melted butter with two cloves of chopped garlic)
• TO EAT: pull the leaves off, dip them in butter and scrape them with your teeth to get the meaty part, discarding the rest. the further in you go, the more tender the leaves will be. when you get to the tiny leaves, grab a spoon and scrape the babies leaves and the thistles (which you do NOT want to eat b/c they hurt when you swallow them, so clean thoroughly) to get to the HEART, which you can just cut into bite-sized pieces of butter dipped heaven and eat

A Light Leek Soup

First, lets start with a pretty picture of ingredients so that no one loses faith in me as a cook:

Rosemary, thyme and garlic

I'm not going to lie. Soup night was BIT of an adventure last night.

Mary is in Guatemala this week with some college friends (jealous!) so I decided to meet up with my partner from Amigos in 2000 (that's right, a DECADE ago) for a drink before soup night. But I also had some dried chickpeas and homemade chicken broth, so first a ran home and threw them into the dutch oven on low so they would be ready when I got home.

When I got back, I was greeted with this:

my apartment

Oh yeah, that's a smoke filled apartment.... and some really burned chickpeas.

The mystery is that I really DID leave the stove on very low. Dutch ovens don't need much heat, that's the whole beauty of them! So I'm blaming the cat. Although I probably shouldn't have left the apartment with the stove on. Safety first!

LUCKILY, I was still able to make a delicious soup.... just not as chickpea-y as I expected. And yes, I am that girl who rescued as many chickpeas as she good and likes the taste of lightly burned (or, in my mind, toasted!) things. You may want to stick to canned though.

separating the weak from strong

And yes, my apartment DOES still smell like burned chickpeas. So does my hair. And my hands. I had to scrub my dutch oven for about 45 minutes to get all the burnt parts off after soaking it overnight. Don't drink and dutch kids. Or don't dutch and then just step out for one drink because you might end up smelling like a Mediterranean market and not in a good way.

On the plus side, my mom always told me eating burned things would make my hair curly.... cheap perm, here I come!

Without further ado....

A Light Leek Soup

• saute 6-8 roughly chopped cloves of garlic in olive oil with a few sprigs of fresh rosemary and thyme

• add the roughly chopped white and light green parts of 3-4 leeks and cook until they're getting a little floppy

• add one bunch of broccoli (include the thin parts of the stem too, and if you want to blend, the whole stalk)chopped into small pieces/florets

• add one large zucchini, sliced and quartered, and about 3 tablespoons of butter, sliced around the pot and stirred in

• cook, stirring occasionally, until broccoli is bright green and zucchini is mostly soft

• add chicken (or veggie) broth, barely covering veggies and about 1.5 cups of cooked "toasted" chickpeas.... or just an unburned can of chickpeas

  • note: I used a broth that I'd already infused with lemon, which was GREAT, but you can also just squeeze the juice of 1-2 lemons in at this point

• simmer a little while until veggies are done all the way through and serve!

  
  

  
  

Mushroom Soup with Parsley Dumplings

So Alayna had a board meeting and in a strange swing of ambition I decided that I'd tackle a hard soup all by myself. And tackle is exactly what I did. I feel like this soup and I had a love hate relationship for the entire 2.5 hour cooking process. Maybe it was after going to the food store and spending $35 mostly all on ingredients (dried mushrooms, $8- actually you can remove this step if you want and just add 2 more cups of broth- it is less of an earthy taste but I mean, I'm cheap and sort of regret it, so just sayin.' Also, note I bitch that I spent $35 on soup supplies, which is way more than we normally spend, but still I have 6+ meals out of it. Not bad.)

Or maybe it was getting home, exhausted with 5 bags in my hands from work/gym/grocery store (this is essentially my gym/tan/laundry only it ends with a book in my bed and not a makeout in the bar) and the prospect of starting this big cooking process seemed daunting.

But I knew if just gave up and put veggies and lentils in a soup pot again and called it a different soup because I added say, both kale and chard, Alayna would kill me. So I embarked.

Note in this picture how I'm using all my burners. Then note how the cabinet above my stove which holds pots is totally empty. God bless dishwashers. All in all this soup was really good. I sort of butchered those dumplings because I never used an electric mixer or processor and instead did it all with fork and bowl. So they were eh, a little lumpy. Whatever, I'd eat lumpy dumplings over washing two more things any day. This soup was souper good though. At 10:30pm when I finally sat down with my bowl of mushroom soup and dumplings I was pretty proud of myself. Soups up laddles!

Ingredients

• 2 cups water
• 3/4 ounce dried chanterelle mushrooms
• 3 1/2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, divided
• 4 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 pound crimini (baby bella) mushrooms, sliced
• 1 teaspoon thyme
• Fine sea salt
• 3 tablespoons dry white wine
• 1 big onion
• 3 thinly sliced leeks
• 4cups vegetable broth (such as Swanson)
• A big pinch of cayenne pepper
• a couple handfuls of carrots
• 1/2 bag of spinach
  

Parsley Dumplings

• 3/4 cup (scant) low-fat cottage cheese
• 6 tablespoons (3/4 stick) butter, room temperature, divided
• 2 large eggs, room temperature
• 1 cup all purpose flour, divided
• 1 teaspoon fine sea salt
• Pinch of ground nutmeg
• 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese
• 3/4 cup finely chopped fresh Italian parsley

Preparation

Soup

• Bring 2 cups water and dried mushrooms to boil in small saucepan. Simmer for 20 minutes. Put aside (with liquid)
  
• Heat 2 tablespoons oil in heavy large skillet over medium-high heat. Add garlic; stir 30 seconds. Add baby bella mushrooms and thyme; sprinkle with sea salt and sauté until mushrooms are browned, stirring often, about 12 minutes. Add wine; stir until liquid is absorbed, about 1 minute. Set mushroom mixture aside.
• Heat 1 1/2 tablespoons oil in another heavy large skillet over medium-high heat. Add onion; cook until translucent and beginning to brown, stirring often, about 6 minutes. Add leeks and carrots reduce heat to medium, sprinkle with sea salt, and sauté until vegetables are soft and golden, stirring often, about 15 minutes.
• Bring broth to simmer in large pot over medium-high heat. Pour in reserved mushroom cooking liquid, leaving sediment behind. Add all mushrooms, onion mixture, and cayenne. Add spinach. Keep this pot simmering while you make your dumplings, occasionally giving it a stir.

Parsley Dumplings

• Puree cottage cheese in mini processor until smooth. Using electric mixer, beat 3 tablespoons butter and eggs in medium bowl. Add cottage cheese, 1/2 cup flour, 1 teaspoon sea salt, and nutmeg; beat on low speed just to blend. Stir in 1/2 cup flour, cheese, and parsley.
• Bring large pot of salted water to boil. Using teaspoon, scoop piece of dough about size of cherry. Holding spoon just above boiling water, use second spoon to push dough into water. Working quickly, repeat about 10 more times. When dumplings rise to surface, simmer until cooked through, 2 1/2 to 3 minutes. Using slotted spoon, transfer dumplings to large plate. Repeat with remaining dough.
• Melt 3 tablespoons butter in large skillet over medium heat. Working in 2 batches, add dumplings to skillet. Cook until brown in spots, 2 to 3 minutes per side.
• Bring soup to simmer. Divide dumplings among wide shallow bowls. Divide soup among bowls and serve.

Cock-a-Leekie Soup (yes that's a real name)

So this weekend my dear friend and fellow-blogger Mary-Lorraine left me to my own devices for not one, but TWO blog-meals. She went to the wilds of Vermont DESPITE Friday being national soup day AND Monday being Martin Luther King day, which, like all no-work Mondays, is a day of extra complicated (or at least long) souping. And sometimes bread baking. I know, intense.

The upshot was that I had a wonderful weekend with some friends I don't normally see. Friday I hosted Alexa, Elizabeth and Drew (all former Amigos volunteers and incredibly entertaining) for a vegan Ethiopian feast that featured not one, not two, but three stews and some hand-purchased-from-a-restaurant traditional bread, and then Monday Lindsay came over to share some Martha Stewart inspired cock-a-leekie soup with home-made rolls from Kate's Mom's recipe. Deeeelicious.

You'll have to check Friday's Dinners for the Ethiopian food, but here is some good old chicken soup with a twist of... prunes? Don't worry, it was delicious.

Cock-a-Leekie Soup

This soup starts in the afternoon, so make sure you’ve got enough time on your hands!!!
• Start off my taking a 3-4 lb chicken and put it in a dutch oven. Chop one onion into eighths, two large carrots into big sized chunks, about 4 celery sticks and peel about 6 cloves of garlic. Arrange them all around the chicken except two of the garlic cloves.
• Stuff a bundle of fresh rosemary, thyme and oregano into the body cavity of the chicken (check to make sure they don’t have the bagged intestines inside... gross, but important) with the two cloves of garlic, and spread a smaller bundle around with the onions and carrots. Sprinkle the whole she-bang with salt and pepper.
• Cook on very low heat for about two hours
• When the chicken is cooked, let it cool off for a little bit and then pull it, the veggies and any herbs out of the pot, leaving any liquid in the bottom of the dutch oven and set aside
• Put about four pints of broth into the pot and bring to a simmer
• Add half a cup of barley (dry), about 7 leeks (white and light green parts only) lightly chopped and about fifteen dried and pitted prunes cut into quarters. Cook for about forty minutes until the barley is cooked through
• While the soup is cooking, let the chicken and reserved veggies cool.... roughly chop them and set them aside. De-bone the chicken, discarding the skin and keeping the bones to make broth later, and shredding the meat into bite-sized pieces.
• Once the barley is cooked through, add the veggies and about half of the chicken meat back into the soup, along with a handful of fresh parsely
• Simmer for about ten more minutes and eat!

Egg Buns (From Kate’s mom)

This is another one that takes a while! Just so you know!
• Soften 2 teaspoons of dry yeast in 2 tablespoons of warm (not hot) water. Let it sit while you get the rest of the ingredients together.
• Beat 2 eggs, 5/8 cup of whole milk and 1/3 cup melted butter together. Add 1 teaspoon of salt, 3 tablespoons of sugar and yeast mixture. Stir well.
• Slowly beat in flour, first a cup, then in half cup increments or less. The MOST you should use is 3 cups, but you might not need it all. When dough is no longer runny, turn it out onto a well-floured surface (really put a lot of flour on there, not just a dusting) and knead for 10 minutes. Add more flour as needed to keep it from sticking to the surface, but try to use as little flour as possible. You want your dough to be very tender and soft, like a baby’s bottom, not stiff.
• Put dough into a lightly oiled bowl, cover with a moist cloth or plastic wrap, and set in a warm place for 1- 1.5 hours until it has doubled in size. If you stick your finger in the dough and the depression bounces back, let it rise a bit more.
• Turn the dough out onto the floured surface (just a dusting this time) and cut into 12 equal pieces. Form each into a roll and place on a baking sheet that has been dusted with cornmeal (or greased with oil or butter) about 1” – 2” apart. Cover the rolls with the cloth or plastic wrap and let rise in a warm place for 1 hour, until double in size (same test with your finger).
• Bake in preheated oven at 375 for 10-15 minutes or until brown.

Artichoke My Heart

"You have a bright future ahead of you.

Go into the world.

And use everything we have taught you."

-Tyson Bedford, "Make Me A Supermodel"

Kate has a magic bullet. Alayna has artichoke hearts. You've heard this story before...

Nooo, you haven't.

I was doing who knows what in Jersey so I could not partake on this adventure but Monday Soup fan, Lauren, filled in. Everything was moving along great.

Onions were sauteing...

Alayna was chopping hearts...

Stuff was going in the pot...

The cat was in the bag...

And then... it's time to puree.

"Oh Lauren, it's time to blend," Alayna said, innocently. Having no idea what was about to happen next.

"Yes!" said Lauren, excited to watch Monday Soup in real time and not just recaptured on this blog.

"Lets go to the blender," Alayna says. Bowl in hand. There they go. Five feet from the kitchen. To the corner of the apartment. By the bookshelf.

No one had any idea what was about to happen.

It was the age of innocence.

THE BLENDER IS BROKEN!

Can't you see the crack in the blender?

And that's when Kate's magic bullet comes in. And the story reaches our Monday's happy ending.

Unfortunately, that magic bullet is a wee little thing. And Alayna and soup crew dirtied every dish in the apartment. But worse has happened. And I wasn't there to have to do the dishes.

Now, for the soup:

Ingredients

The hearts from 6 large artichokes
butter
2 leeks
6 garlic cloves, chopped
3 chopped shallots
2 handfulls of baby red potatoes
Veg/Chicken Stock
1/2 bay leaf
Thyme
Handful of chopped parsley
half and half or heavy cream

salt and pepper to taste

Method

1 Cut the artichokes lengthwise into quarters. With a small knife, remove the thistley choke part and discard. Cut away the leaves from the artichoke heart and reserve for steaming and eating later. This will probably take longer than you think. Cut or peel away the tough outside skin of the stems and discard. Chop hearts to 1/4 inch thickness

2 In a large pot, melt half a stick of butter and cook the artichoke hearts, leek, garlic, and shallots on medium heat covered until tender (can stick a fork through hearts). Add diced potatoes and broth, about 2-4 bay leave, a handful of parsley and some thyme. Bring soup to a simmer and let cook covered until everything is tender (about 45 min).

3 Remove and discard the bay leaves. Purée the soup with your magic bullet if you somehow accidentally broke your blender body (oops!) and add cream to taste once all blended. Add salt/pepper as desired.

Lauren, with all of our dishes, dirty.

Oyster Stew

This how family helps you make soup

Alayna's email to her sister:

Do you know mom's oyster stew recipe? I want to make it tonight.

Sister's email to Alayna:

Mmm... no. I asked mom once and she was like, you know, just throw in potatoes, onion, butter, celery, cream, oyster and call it a day. I'd ask her for a more specific recommendation.

That sounds delish, though!!

Alayna's email to her mother:

Hey Mom,

Can you send me the oyster stew recipe? I know it's easy!

Mother's email to Alayna:

Ok, no recipe. Use a can of oysters- add it to: onion/celery/potatoes that have been sauted and cooked and then add milk/butter and pepper to taste.

Today's soup?

I'm sorry I wasn't so talkative last night... last 10 minutes of new Law & Order....

Love,

Mom

Alayna's email to her mother:

Haha! Definitely understandable. There was some good Law and Ordering happening last night.

Do you think the stew will be bad if I add some stuff to it? Like maybe spinach for iron? I guess that's it.

Love you!

Mother to Alayna:

I think it would be delicious!!! Love, mom

Thanks for understanding.

Alayna's Mom's Oyster Stew

Set 2 handfuls of red potatoes chopped into bite sized pieces to boil in a separate pot

Saute 1 medium sized yellow onion chopped in olive oil (in soup bowl)

and 1/2 a stick of butter

Add 2 or 3 leeks cut into bite sized pieces (just the white parts)

Chop 5 celery stalks, with the stringy ends cut off, into bite sized pieces and add to saute

Add 1 box of baby portabella mushrooms

While that's cooking add another 1/2 of butter

Wait until the veggies aren't all the way soft, but still sort of crunchy (same with potatoes) Drain the potatoes and add to the soup.

Pour in 2 cans of oysters with their juices

And top it off with whole milk just so you cover all the stuff you put in

Add salt and pepper to taste

Add an additional 1/2 stick of butter (optional but Alayna really likes butter)

Presto!

We also made roasted eggplant, asparagus and brie sandwiches on whole wheat pitas.

Follow up:

(Tuesday, lunchtime of leftovers, at work)

Alayna: Mary! I just found a wee pearl in my oyster stew

Mary Lorraine: ??

Alayna: By biting it

Mary Lorraine: liar!

Alayna: no! true. i will photograph for evidence with camera phone

Mary Lorraine: holy heck!

Alayna: I took a picture of it next to my pearl earring

Mary Lorraine: We will figure out how to transfer camera phone picture to blog.

Turns out, we could not figure this out.

We just make soup.

Asparagus Squash Soup

aPoor sad and wonderful Harold Brodkey the dead author I discovered in the smallest used bookstore with the most books in Camden, Maine, concludes arguably his most famous story First Love and Other Sorrows with the love of soup.

I was reminded of this while I was re-reading this story on a walk to a friend's apartment in the East Village. I mastered the art of walking and reading long ago. Even after I arrived at the apartment's walk-up I stayed outside in the crisp early evening Saturday leaning on the railing to finish the story as couples and crazies passed me by.

The story is set in the late '50's. A daughter is about to get married to rich man she probably doesn't love. The father is long dead. And there is the pre-teen son observing it all.

"I'm hungry, too," she said. "I don't know why." She drifted over to the table, and bent over the chicken. "I guess emotion makes people hungry."

The mother pushed open the swinging door, from the dining-room side. "There you are," she said. She looked flustered. "Are you eating at this time of night?"

My sister said she was hungry, too.

"There's some soup," my mother said. "Why don't I heat it up." And suddenly her eyes filled with tears, and all at once we fell to kissing one another- to embracing and smiling and making cheerful predictions about one another- there in the white, brightly lighted kitchen. We had known each other for so long, and there were so many things we all three remembered... Our smiles, our approving glances, wandered from face to face. There was a feeling of politeness in the air. We were behaving the way we would in railway stations, at my sister's wedding, at the birth of her first child, at my graduation from college.

This was the first of our reunions.

Perhaps This Was Their Soup

In soup bowl saute

1/2 an onion chopped

2 leeks chopped

1 yellow squash chopped

1 bunch of asparagus cut into inch pieces or smaller

Add in olive oil and 1/2 a stick of butter

with a few sprigs of fresh thyme and rosemary

At the same time boil a handful and a half of red potatoes (with skins) in separate pot

When the veggies are crispy but mostly cooked through add the potatoes into the soup pot

Add a squeeze of one lemon

And add enough chicken broth to cover the veggies

Take off heat, puree in a blender.