Lime Soup

I first had lime soup when Alayna made it in France for a dinner party. Because we used to live in France and have dinner parties where I would shove white candles in old Champagne bottles and the guests would do all the dishes. Insert sigh here.

Either way, if you happen to have a cold, or feel a cold coming on, Lime Soup is the thing to do. Because by your third spoonful you'll notice your nose is running. And by the end of the bowl you're all cleared up.

Alayna would like to insert a tip here: "I hate doing dishes [she does, it's true], so I like to chop all the fruits/veggies/herbs first then the chicken. That way I don't have to switch knives, meaning I use my favorite knife the whole time and only one chopping board!"

Nice tip. For those of you who don't get why that's a tip it's because you don't chop raw chicken with the same knife you are going to use for the other stuff. Duh.

Okay, aprons on! Here we go:

Start by taking 3 to 4 tortillas and cutting them into strips, set aside.

Dice 6 to 8 cloves of garlic and sauttee in olive oil in your soup pot with 3 to 4 whole dried chili peppers

Chop 1 large yellow onion and add to garlic

When onion is getting translucent, dump in 1 large can of plain diced tomatoes with juice

Add 2 more cans of water and chicken bullion (or chicken broth)

Put on medium heat and allow to slowly come to a boil.

Chop a generous handful of cilantro and set aside until soup broth is hot, then add

Slice 2 small limes into wedges and set aside

Cut open another 4 limes (that's 6 limes you'll need total) for squeezing into the broth and do so immediately

Slice up 1 avocado and set it aside.

Chop 3 chicken thighs into bite size pieces and sauttee in a separate pan in olive oil until cooked through, adding a few shakes of salt and some black pepper.

Since this is all kind of happening at the same time, watch your pot! Once the broth is getting hot, add your cilantro, and then once it's really hot and the chicken is cooked through, add the chicken to the broth (Make sure you've left enough space!)

Let it all cook together on med-high for five minutes

Bring the temp down to med-low and throw in the lime slices for the last five minutes

Top: Frying the tortilla strips / Bottom: Adding fresh limes to soup

Don't wash your chicken pan! Instead, put in some more olive oil and fry up your tortilla strips (rotating once) until golden and crispy

Lay them on a paper towel to soak up extra oil, this will probably take a few batches to get enough done (and they are delicious).

Once you have all the elements of your soup, put the soup in bowls, shred pepper jack cheese in the soup, some sliced avocados on top of the cheese and the tortilla strips on top of that (so they don't get soggy fast!)

It all sounds complicated, but it isn't! I promise!

Important Note: If you're storing the soup to eat through the week, take out the extra lime rinds they can make the broth bitter when they're re-heated.

Alayna in a work outfit she was proud of, with soup, in living room.

Note: Mary Lorraine chose not to be featured in this week's soup post because she realized she wears the same orange sweatshirt every Monday night.

This Is How You Figure Out How to Make Soup / Asparagus Soup

That is what Zizi looks like when she is really excited about the soup.

Email message sent at 9:21 AM, Monday.

Alayna: I think it is essential that we incorporate the pate from book club into soup night. Also, we have very little room in the refrigerator. SO, I suggest we make an asparagus soup and pate/cheese sandwiches to dip into it.

Email message sent at 10:04 AM

Mary Lorraine: I think that sounds wonderful. What should I buy? So last night... (Author's note: I am cutting out said boy drama because it is not relevant to soup)

Email message sent at 12:01 PM

Alayna: We need baguettes. That's right, plural. I think two. That way we have our pate sandwiches both today and for lunch tomorrow. Uhm. Not that I like planning ahead. Other than that, if you can buy leeks, asparagus and some half and half, we should be good! Get from Key Foods, cheaper. 

Um, that sounds awkward did you... (removed).

Email message sent at 12:23PM

Mary Lorraine: On it.. Um, yeah. We had a little disagreement about... (more message removed.)

See you tonight!

Here's What You Do:

Sauttee a medium sized yellow onion and three leeks (only the white parts) in olive oil until translucent

Add in thyme at some point (fresh or dry)

Chop up 2 bunches of asparagus into small pieces, toss 'em in and mix

Add half a stick of butter and squeeze 1 lemon

Also throw in a few handfuls of spinach to add more iron!

When they turn bright green and are no longer super crunchy add enough chicken broth (or water with a chicken broth packet) to cover (not too watery!)

Add salt and pepper to taste

Let cook until soft all the way through

Now it should look like this:

Throw it into a blender in parts and blend to whatever consistency suits your taste.

Add half and half to taste. 

Adding pate sandwiches with different sorts of nice cheeses is a good addition. 

Or make little tea sandwiches where you cut off the crusts because that is classy and this is a classy soup.

Finished product!

 

Enjoy!

"It Was Really Good" Mushroom Soup

Meet our mushroom soup.

Meet our cat.

I have been in a bit of a haze recently and can't really remember the details behind the night Alayna created this miracle upon miracles soup. I do remember however, that as we took  our first bites Alayna became pensive. She looked at her bowl. Took another bite. Thought. And then she announced, I think this is the best soup. 

It is a really good soup. It's hearty but not so rich it holds you down. But it is a nice meal and it's good with nice bread. 

Here you go:

Sauttee one large yellow onion (chopped) and

2 to 3 leeks  (chopped, just the white parts)

with fresh thyme (no stems)

and red (hot) pepper in olive oil

add a large handful of chopped baby carrots, keep on low heat and cover

Add the following, all chopped, the following order (keep the pot covered between dumping things in)

1 large portobella mushroom (no stem)

1 box of baby  portobella mushrooms

1 large handful of shitake mushrooms (no stems)

1 box of regular (button) mushrooms

and a half stick of butter

and a bunch of fresh spinach

When mushrooms look cooked through (20-30 minutes) add enough water to cover, this will be blended so you don't want it to be too thin. 

Add 2 packets of chicken bullion

Add more thyme, black pepper, salt and red pepper to taste and pour in about 1/2 glass to 3/4 of dry white wine

Once the soup is heated through, turn off the burner

Now the soup should look like this:

Lovely, I know. But you aren't finished yet.

Puree the soup in a blender in parts. I like to leave it pretty coarse so that it is hearty looking and can be picked up with bread.

Add heavy cream (or half and half) to taste. About a cup probably.

Enjoy!

More than Tomato Soup

Buttering bread.

Simmering soup.

& cool cheese.

More Than Tomato Soup

Alayna was on vacation but we were still brainstorming soup ideas for this week because making soup isn't an occasion it's a lifestyle.

As you might know we are swiftly approaching good 'ol V-Day, for this reason and many more. (One of which being a personally unfortunate incident while running along the East River involving an overeager, deranged homeless dude-- lets leave it at that.) I wanted something comforting and I wanted something red.

When we start our "Sauce Blog," you might realize that this tomato soup is closely related to a wonderful penne a la vodka sauce but for now you just know it as a wonderful, rich and tangy tomato soup. This tomato soup is creamy and has a zingy bite. It's easy (so easy I, as in Mary Lorraine, made most of it) and it's good.

If you have been reading this blog but haven't actually made one of these soups I recommend this to be your first try. It's a people pleaser. Make it with a grilled cheese sandwich with fancy cheeses and be prepared to eat until you have a stomachache. Like I do, right now.

What You Need:

2 big cans of crushed tomatoes

6 cloves of garlic chopped

red pepper (like the spice not the vegetable)

heavy cream

olive oil

a bunch of basil, chopped

What You Do:

Sautee chopped garlic in big soup bowl.

Add a generous portion of red pepper.

When sauteed dump in the two cans of crushed tomatoes and stir

Add the basil (a lot of basil)

Let simmer for about 30 minutes

Add as much heavy cream as desired, depending on your tomato soup cream preference.

I know, so easy!

Hello Mrs. Mushroom, Meet Mr. Potato (Soup)

Ah, It seems like only yesterday I had to call Alayna to ask her what a leek looked like when she told me to pick them up from a store.

"A bloated scallion," she said. She was right. That's like, exactly what leeks look like.

However, many months later when I was a seasoned leek hunter Alayna called, frantic, it was soup night and she had not been able to find leeks at Whole Foods. I was leaving the gym, I was red as a beet but was up for the challenge.

In the east village there is at least one bodega on every street corner. I was walking home fourteen blocks, this means I must have gone into at least fourteen bodegas. That was the night I discovered bodegas don't sell leeks.

Oh well, we did without. But as we enjoyed this soup... which let me tell you, is a winner, we discussed how leeks would have added to it. And then the discussion trickled into our Monday night stream of conscious which often include a mixture of thoughts concerning the kitten, MTV's "Bromance," and the meatiness a leek can provide for a soup.

Ingredients:

Butter 2 leeks, chopped (use yellow onion if you have no leeks, or combine one leek, one onion for more flavor)

Large handful of baby carrots

6 cups chicken broth

dried dill weed

salt

ground black pepper

bay leaf

2 pounds red potatoes, diced

1 pound fresh mushrooms (mix regular and baby portabella, or any other type of mushroom you like!), sliced

1 cup half-and-half 1/4 cup all-purpose flour

Directions:

1.Melt some butter butter in a large saucepan over medium heat. Mix in leeks and carrots, and cook 5 minutes. Pour in broth. Season with dill, salt, pepper, and bay leaf. Mix in potatoes, cover, and until potatoes are tender but firm (about 20 min).

2.Melt more butter in a skillet over medium heat, and saute the mushrooms 5 minutes, until lightly browned. Stir into the soup.

3.In a small bowl, mix the half-and-half and flour until smooth. Stir into the soup to thicken.

Barley's the Best Soup

(Alayna got dressed and put on makeup for this picture. This blog is a big deal.)

Big News! I voted this soup the best of ALL the soups we have had to date. And I know, I know what you're thinking. "Great. This is the third soup on the blog." Well, let me tell you a little secret we have made more than three soups. The ones that don't make the blog have nothing to do with the quality of the soup and everything to do with my overall laziness. I regress, point being, I think this soup is the best.

Alayna won't make the grand statement yet, but I will. Anyway, we made this soup on the wonderful, workless Martin Luther King day. That was good because it was easy to let the barley soak for three hours (who knew?). There was a light nice snow fall. I bought two big canvases in Soho. Alayna got her bangs trimmed. Great day. Great soup. Here you go...

Ingredients

1 cup of barley

chicken broth

one large onion

three leaks (white and light green parts only!)

two large carrots

a few celery sticks

olive oil

two fistful of shitake and baby portabella mushrooms

1/3 cup of fresh parsley

rosemary sprigs

3 to 4 boneless skinless chicken thighs, chopped into bite size pieces

Do This...

-cover 1 cup of barley in cold water and let it soak at least 3.5 hours

-once it has soaked, put into your soup pot and cover with about 9 cups of chicken broth and simmer... it will need to simmer for another 1 to 1.5 hours so don't get hungry yet

-in a seperate pan, sautee in order half a large onion, three leeks, two handfuls of carrots and a handful of celery in olive oil for about five minutes

-once things are sauteed nicely but still crispy, dump them into the soup pot!

-slice up shitake and baby portabella mushrooms and throw them into the pot too

-get about 1/3 cup of fresh parsley, chopped, into the pot, and rosemary sprigs (not the stalks) into the soup

-chop up 3-4 chicken and sautee in pan you used for the veggies (add more olive oil). Once pieces are cooked through toss them in the pot (there is a theme here)

-let the soup simmer for the rest of the 1 to 1.5 hours OR until the barley and veggies are nice and tender... enjoy!

Butternut Squash Soup

Friends love soup.

Oh no, someone ate too much soup!

A favorite for all. Even our precious semi-vegan, always-inspiring roommate Kate came home and asked for a bowl. This is a good soup for the dark days of winter when you forget how sunlight feels. When the bright orange color of the soup might awaken your senses...

Sorry.This post intro is getting dumber by the sentence. It's Thursday night. It's dark and snowing and I'm tired and I just watched two episodes of Top Chef alone while drinking Red Stripe and eating Ramen Noodles and I don't know what I want to do with my life.

Right, so, ladies and gentlemen... drum roll... Bitternut Squash Soup*

*It's not really called "Bitternut" fools. It's a joke, as in I was Bitter. But no one got it, so I changed the title. Maybe the joke's on mehhhh.

What You Need:

olive oil
1 yellow, medium sized onion
2 to 3 tablespoons of minced fresh ginger
1 butternut squash peeled and diced
1 sweet potato and a yam or two... which combined are about the sizeof the squash
6 cups of water
chicken or veggie stock
salt and peppa

1. Heat the oil in a soup pot over medium heat. Add the onion andcook, stirring, until tender, about 5 minutes. Add the ginger and stirtogether until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add the squash, sweetpotatoes, regular potato, and water or stock, and bring to a simmer.Add salt to taste, reduce the heat, cover and simmer 30-45minutes, oruntil all of the ingredients are thoroughly tender.

2. Takeout the soup in batches and blend... for thicker soup, youwon't include all of the broth, but make sure you get all the gingerand onion for extra deliciousness!!

3. add salt and pepper to taste.
Enjoy!