22 posts tagged “soup”
This was actually supposed to be a red curry (ie., with a stew-like consistency) but I had to improvise quite a bit since I ran out of certain ingredients. It was supposed to use only red curry paste, but I had to supplement it with some green paste, which is much, much hotter. Then I had to adjust with additional coconut milk and also water, and a prolonged cooking period to reduce the hotness. Very improvised, and a bit embarrassing. But it did taste great.
I think I've seen recipes that combines the red and green pastes, and that I might have cooked a dish like that. Whether I have or not, those two pastes actually creates a really interesting taste.
Clearing out the last remaining tomatoes, I decided to completely improvise. To the point that I don't clearly remember exactly what I did. It was just a standard mirepoix with tomatoes added, plus typical Thai things like fish sauce and kaffir lime leaves — and plenty of other things, I'm sure. I've got some in the freezer, that I will add coconut milk to when I thaw it, because this soup was a little too sharp. It would probably be much better when rounded off and softened a little with the sweetness of coconut milk.
Nothing much to say about this one — except that although making soup can be pretty time consuming, it's well worth it because the frozen leftovers makes for an extremely easy meal...
Miso soup with shrimp and chicken stock, mushrooms, scallions and noodles.
A salad with garlic-rosemary croutons from homemade bread, Roma tomatoes and cucumber, with lettuce tossed in a Hoisin, soy and toasted sesame seed oil dressing.
While I'm in no danger of running out of ideas about what to do with them, my enthusiasm for tomatoes has dwindled a bit lately. In the beginning, I couldn't make a simple sandwich without piling on slices of beautiful, sweet, fantastic tomatoes. Now, not so much. I guess I'll have to start looking into how best to preserve these suckers.
This was a very nice soup — well, except for the color. And the taste...
It dawned on me: who the hell makes tomato soup from scratch anymore? I mean, I've never ever tasted, or seen anything except Campbell's. Seriously, I have no idea what a proper, home-made tomato soup is supposed to taste, or look like. When I thaw out the stuff I froze, I hope I'll remember to add some food coloring to it. You eat with your eyes, as they say...
(Oh yeah, that's basil, the green stuff in the soup.)
The recipe suggested cooked chicken, pork or shrimp. Right there, I should have taken notice — those are quite different proteins, as far as taste, texture and appearance goes. Dilled spinach soup is something I'd be happy to try, cold or hot. Now, I'd willing, but reluctant to try it hot. This was kinda crap.
But the cheesecake was fantastic. Extremely light and fluffy.
I'm reminded of the time when I first got into cooking. Well, until I got into French cookery. And I then discovered that this whole a la meuniere thing — I knew how to do that all along; I just didn't know what it was. There's nothing fancy-pantsy about it at all: catch a trout, prep it and dust some flour on it, and fry (ah — sauté it!), and Bob's yer mother's brother.
One of the culinary goals I set for myself this summer, was cold soups. Gazpacho is obvious. But then there's Vichyssouise — much harder to spell, and pronounce. But hey, it's a fancy-pants French thing, so hey, lets try that.
Well, I've apparently done vichyssouise soups before. It's just leeks and potatoes. And I've done that before — both cold and warm.
I love this. I'm all like, fucking cultured and shit, and I didn't even know it. Yeehaw. I love me some culture.
No, really, I do.
One goal I set for myself this summer, was to make some cold soups. I was kinda thinking about gazpacho or vichyssoise when I came up with this idea, but then I ran into a recipe for this soup, which recommended it to be served either hot or cold. And I agree wholeheartedly — this thing works both ways. I've done it warm before. On a warm summer day, it is just as good, when served cold.
Frozen and re-heated. The cheese thickens the soup, but it also adds a lot of flavor — and salt. It gives it an odd texture, really. I think I added a bit too much of it, but overall, it was very tasty. Quite honestly, the reason why I ended up eating it was mostly because I actually wanted to make some split pean soup, but felt a tad guilty about making more soup when I knew I already had some stowed away in the freezer. I believe I also have some carrot-based soup in there somewhere. And the cold season is coming to an end, which is a real bummer.
A simple, green salad to go with the soup. Spinach, lettuce, cherry tomatoes, a modest Caesar salad dressing, freshly ground pepper, and a few shavings of some Parmesan cheese.
Whoa, that looks a bit green. Tasted very, very good, though. Only problem is the weather is abandoning us — it just wasn't quite cold enough to be truly enjoyable. The tiny little respite we get from the scorching temperatures around here looks about to come to an end. We get a wee bit of rain and some cool-ish air for a few weeks and then it's back to "sorry about the smell of burning bacon; I just touched the steering wheel on my car..." The missionaries had all sorts of trouble trying to Christianize the Scandihoovians — one that comes to mind is that when they warned them they'd all suffer horribly, burning in an eternal fire if they didn't accept the Prince of Peace, they all went "ooh, that sounds nice, what do we have to do to go there?" Well screw that. The vikings were retards. They wouldn't have that flippant attitude if they lived around here.
Oh yeah, the soup. Chop up a head of cauliflower and three potatoes and boil it in about 4-5 cups of vegetable broth. When mushy (about 15 minutes), attack with potato masher or stick blender (or just do part of it in a stand blender or food processor) until you reach the consistency you'd like. If using a stick blender, keep it under the surface of the soup at all times. I know this sounds patronizing, because this is just basic, common sense — any cook worth his salt knows this. I did. And after tonight, I know it a little better. I breached the surface twice and I thought it was a terrible pity that it wasn't a tomato based soup, because I could have taken some pictures of the kitchen and convince people that they were pictures from the scene of some gruesome machete massacre. It was a mess.
Chop up two leeks (dirty bastard, they are. Remember to rinse it very well) and sautée them in some oil. Add to soup pot and let go for about five minutes.
Add some grated Parmesan. This provides both flavor and a thickening effect — but very importantly, also salt. The broth I used wasn't a reduced sodium version, which I normally use, and so I salted the stuff (like you normally do when boiling potatoes and such), and with the parm, it ended up a little too salty. Again, basic stuff — but I keep forgetting little things like that.
Add anything from 1 tablespoon to 1/2 cup of chopped parsley, and 1 tablespoon of chopped chives.
Add 1/4 teaspoon of freshly grated nutmeg. (I hate pre-ground nutmeg. It doesn't taste anything like the real thing. There are plenty of ground spices that taste just as good, or even better than the fresh stuff, but nutmeg is not one of them.)
Adjust seasoning with salt and white pepper and serve, garnished with more parsley.
The garnish leaves something to be desired, though. Everything's green. I'm thinking it would make more sense to use strips of red or yellow bell peppers, or capsicum peppers even. Or croûtons. Anything that isn't green — hell, some halved cherry tomatoes would improve the looks a lot, as well as adding some flavor (oh yeah, if you'd pan-fry them before adding them in).
On the side, I served some garlic Parmesan toast. Bread, margarine, lots of crushed garlic, grated parm, in the toaster oven until the cheese starts changing color — Parmesan toast, done! I've gotta stop watching "The F Word."
Ah, and this was a vegetarian meal (or possibly a vegan meal, since I used margarine instead of butter [Edit: of course not — Parmesan is a dairy product]) — quite unintended. I remain a meat eater, but between this and aloo gobi, and uh, me accidentally making a bacon and spinach quiche without bacon*, well, the vegetarian grub I come up with is often so damn good I'd be perfectly happy to eat vegetarian half of the time, methinks.
*Of course, the accident that caused the bacon and spinach quiche to be bacon-free was caused by the unintended and entirely unforeseen accident of me eating all that lovely, crispy crunchy bacon before I had a chance to add it to the quiche. But I've heard of people calling themselves vegetarians even though they eat fish (or even chicken) and labels like ovo-lacto vegetarian and/or vegan and I dunno, that Lisa Simpson fifth-level vegan who didn't eat anything that cast a shadow and whatnot.
Well I'm thinking I might be on to something here: Bacon Vegetarianism. Man, that'd just spread like wildfire, that. I should call up Greenpeace and Peta and let them know I've figured out a way to stop people from killing any animals, almost — we'd have to accept the compromise that well, we'd have to sacrifice the piggies. Pigs are very intelligent and social animals, so I'm sure they wouldn't mind giving up their flesh and blood to save all other animals. They'd be like the animal kingdom's J. C. Hog Messiah.
A final note: When I ate this as leftovers, I cut it with some milk. This improved the taste quite a lot, since it originally was a tad powerful in flavor, and also a bit too salty.
Oh yeah, the soup. Chop up a head of cauliflower and three potatoes and boil it in about 4-5 cups of vegetable broth. When mushy (about 15 minutes), attack with potato masher or stick blender (or just do part of it in a stand blender or food processor) until you reach the consistency you'd like. If using a stick blender, keep it under the surface of the soup at all times. I know this sounds patronizing, because this is just basic, common sense — any cook worth his salt knows this. I did. And after tonight, I know it a little better. I breached the surface twice and I thought it was a terrible pity that it wasn't a tomato based soup, because I could have taken some pictures of the kitchen and convince people that they were pictures from the scene of some gruesome machete massacre. It was a mess.
Chop up two leeks (dirty bastard, they are. Remember to rinse it very well) and sautée them in some oil. Add to soup pot and let go for about five minutes.
Add some grated Parmesan. This provides both flavor and a thickening effect — but very importantly, also salt. The broth I used wasn't a reduced sodium version, which I normally use, and so I salted the stuff (like you normally do when boiling potatoes and such), and with the parm, it ended up a little too salty. Again, basic stuff — but I keep forgetting little things like that.
Add anything from 1 tablespoon to 1/2 cup of chopped parsley, and 1 tablespoon of chopped chives.
Add 1/4 teaspoon of freshly grated nutmeg. (I hate pre-ground nutmeg. It doesn't taste anything like the real thing. There are plenty of ground spices that taste just as good, or even better than the fresh stuff, but nutmeg is not one of them.)
Adjust seasoning with salt and white pepper and serve, garnished with more parsley.
The garnish leaves something to be desired, though. Everything's green. I'm thinking it would make more sense to use strips of red or yellow bell peppers, or capsicum peppers even. Or croûtons. Anything that isn't green — hell, some halved cherry tomatoes would improve the looks a lot, as well as adding some flavor (oh yeah, if you'd pan-fry them before adding them in).
On the side, I served some garlic Parmesan toast. Bread, margarine, lots of crushed garlic, grated parm, in the toaster oven until the cheese starts changing color — Parmesan toast, done! I've gotta stop watching "The F Word."
Ah, and this was a vegetarian meal (or possibly a vegan meal, since I used margarine instead of butter [Edit: of course not — Parmesan is a dairy product]) — quite unintended. I remain a meat eater, but between this and aloo gobi, and uh, me accidentally making a bacon and spinach quiche without bacon*, well, the vegetarian grub I come up with is often so damn good I'd be perfectly happy to eat vegetarian half of the time, methinks.
*Of course, the accident that caused the bacon and spinach quiche to be bacon-free was caused by the unintended and entirely unforeseen accident of me eating all that lovely, crispy crunchy bacon before I had a chance to add it to the quiche. But I've heard of people calling themselves vegetarians even though they eat fish (or even chicken) and labels like ovo-lacto vegetarian and/or vegan and I dunno, that Lisa Simpson fifth-level vegan who didn't eat anything that cast a shadow and whatnot.
Well I'm thinking I might be on to something here: Bacon Vegetarianism. Man, that'd just spread like wildfire, that. I should call up Greenpeace and Peta and let them know I've figured out a way to stop people from killing any animals, almost — we'd have to accept the compromise that well, we'd have to sacrifice the piggies. Pigs are very intelligent and social animals, so I'm sure they wouldn't mind giving up their flesh and blood to save all other animals. They'd be like the animal kingdom's J. C. Hog Messiah.
A final note: When I ate this as leftovers, I cut it with some milk. This improved the taste quite a lot, since it originally was a tad powerful in flavor, and also a bit too salty.
