52 Pots of Soup - Weekly soup recipes for 2009

Failure and new beginnings

2010-01-01T14:32:00.000-08:00

Today was supposed to be the day that I made my final soup of the year - my final soup of 2009, a kickoff to the new year and the new decade. But ladies and gents, I failed miserably. Being short on cash, short on time, short with my family and boyfriend were all the greatest de-motivators one can imagine. With every random soup I made, I found myself sad that I wasn't taking pictures and thinking of how I could write the recipe in an interesting way. So, I admit it. I gave up. I got lazy, I got tired, and I got depressed to a point where soup and good food were simply not interesting at all.

So, now, my resolve is this:

For the entirety of 2010, I will start over. I will make a new pot of soup each week for the year. If I repeat any soups in 2010 that I made in 2009, they will be changed - a vegetarian soup will be made with meat or a meaty soup made vegetarian, or I'll try something new to spice up the original recipe. I will continue, no matter what. I will start again and again if one week I fail and feel like giving up for the entire year, as I did in 2009.

This year will be different.

I wasn't prepared for such a new resolve, but it was only yesterday that I remembered how therapeutic cooking is for me, and how much joy it gives me to think about delicious dishes and to prepare them with my own hands and wit.

Tonight, I'm making Menudo, as is my custom. Nothing about the age-old recipe will be changed, and for tonight, my family and I can enjoy what is tried and true and familiar. But next week? Or a few days from now? We'll be treated to something new. I'm already cooking up a plan, and it involves a sad little acorn squash that has lain uncooked since Thanksgiving.

Ladies and gents, if you could hear my thoughts, you'd hear only a wicked little cackle. I'm back.

Italian Wedding Soup

2009-03-01T19:09:00.000-08:00

No, Italians don't eat this soup at weddings. Also known as "minestra maritata ", or "married soup", this soup is thus named because of the wonderful way that heavy meats blend and "marry" with greens and tomatoes. This soup is my brag soup. I've tweaked it and combined different varieties of minestra maritata that I've tried to make what I make, and I love it.

The challenges I faced with this pot included:

PORTION CONTROL. I've said it a hundred times. I can cook for 50 with ease but I struggle with feeding five. I ordinarily make this soup in a giant stockpot - the kind that old Mexican ladies steam tamales in and that witches can boil small children in. Its a huge, huge pot and my wonderful soup is frequently wasted or pawned off on friends and extended family in tupperwares because there is simply too much soup.

DIFFERENT INGREDIENTS. I make this soup in the heat of the summer with the freshest ingredients. Fresh homemade stock, perfect homegrown tomatoes, fresh corn scraped off of the cob, onions that still have dirt on them, and fresh, beautiful, tender greens that wilt into tasty oblivion in the soup. Alas, the bug hit me to make my wedding soup in early March, when the fresh tomatoes are orange-yellow at best, the corn is a little moldy and $1.50 an ear, the onions are tough and large from being stored, and the greens are frozen. I know some people scoff at the idea of not using the freshest, most in-season veggies. I must admit - this version of my soup is not for you, but its tasty and when handled well, less desireable vegetation can be delicious.

In a few months, I'll make this soup again. No, I won't consider it a repeat that goes against my challenge of unique pots of soup. Why? Using fresh ingredients will change the soup dramatically and requires different prep. Simple enough.

What You'll Need
1.5 pounds ground beef
two 24 ounce cans whole peeled tomatoes
one 16 ounce bag frozen sweet corn
one package frozen spinach, chopped
one half medium onion OR
three green grilling onions
6 oz package of orzo or small pasta
one egg
1/3 cup bread crumbs
garlic paste
garlic powder
white pepper
paprika
Italian seasoning mix (oregano, basil, thyme, rosemary)
salt
butter or extra virgin olive oil

I prefer 85% lean/15% fat meat for this soup, but you can go as far as 90% lean. Any leaner, and the meatballs will lack flavor and won't stick together as well.

Buy the best canned tomatoes you can afford. The one can of brand-name organic tomatoes I had was of much, much greater quality than the can of local-store generic.

By "grilling onions", I mean small, inch-wide onions with green stalks. Here in Texas, we grill them with BBQ. Do you call them something different..?

The orzo/small pasta may be substituted for cooked barley or rice. Its especially tasty with barley.

The How-To

Begin with your meat. Sprinkle with salt and spices to taste. 1/4 teaspoon of each will do if you like plain meatballs; I usually add much more. At least a teaspoon of each.

Garlic paste is my favorite thing in the world. I buy it at a local arabic grocery. Its quite cheap, lasts forever in the fridge (if you don't eat it right away..) and its very convenient. I still love fresh garlic and use it to my heart's content, but garlic paste has earned a special place in my kitchen. I added about one tablespoon to my meatball mix.

The mix before mixing: the egg is nestled in the meat, with 1/2 cup of bread crumbs, at least a teaspoon of white pepper (hold your nose and prepare to sneeze..), a half teaspoon of paprika and the other spices.

Mash thuroughly. Consider adding another egg if your mix is dry or if you use leaner meat.

Prepare your pot: add a splash of oil or enough butter to coat the bottom and throw in halved green onions (or diced regular onion). Some minced fresh garlic or a bit of garlic paste also go nicely.

Form the meat into small, 3/4-inch-wide balls and brown. Its just occured to me that I could bake the meatballs instead..so feel free to try that as well (be sure to deglaze and retrieve the juices for the soup!).

Pardon the steam clouding the image! When the meat is good and brown, use a half shotglass of water to deglaze the bottom of the pot. Better yet..use liquor!

Just cover the meatballs with beef stock. You do not need very much stock yet.

Add one can of tomatoes. Mash the whole tomatoes before dropping them in (and watch out for squirts of tomato juice! They're like balloons!). Increase the heat to medium-high, and let the small amount of stock, meatballs, and tomatoes simmer for 5-10 minutes to let the flavors "marry".

When the meatballs and first tomatoes are finished "marrying", lower the heat, add the second can of tomatoes, and the package of defrosted spinach. I split the two cans into separate cook times, as I do with fresh tomatoes in this recipe - the first can of tomatoes "marries" into the soup and kind of disintegrates during cooking, but the second can of tomatoes remains fleshy and juicy to be eaten as a chunky vegetable in the soup.

Add more stock - approximately the same amount you added to the meatballs. Note the chunks of tomatoes, just added to the mix, and the reddish color of the broth because of the first tomatoes added. Add more paprika to taste - I like this soup to be spicy and add at least a tablespoon of the stuff at this step.

Finally..add the corn! Bring the soup to a simmer once again, and add the orzo or pasta. The orzo will cook within 5 minutes (it is very small). Remove from heat immediately - you do not want the orzo to turn to mush!

If you have it handy, add a few handfuls of fresh spinach before serving. When reheating leftovers, do not allow the pot to boil. Preferably, reheat only what you plan to eat, since multiple reheats will make the pasta or grain turn mushy.

Enjoy!

Roasted Beef Stock

2009-02-20T01:50:00.000-08:00

I guess you can tell that I like to make stock. Since I've already gone into it, I suppose I don't need to go into more detail about stock lore and the wonders of boiled bones. I was recently in the mood for a nice beefy soup, so when I saw beautiful, thick beef knuckles on sale for .79c a pound, I had to give in.

I've been appalled lately at the sight of soup bones on sale for upwards of $5 a pound. Nope, not organic beef bones. Not veal bones or buffalo. I'm talking about plain beef knuckles and oxtails. Folks - don't throw your money away. What you're being sold is practically offal. You could buy yourself some nice steak for the price of these bones, so don't be fooled by supermarkets trying to make a buck. Go to places that have actual butchers on site, and you'll find bones at a better cost. I never pay more than $2-3 a pound for soup bones - and that is only if they're especially fresh and meaty.

As I've said before - beef knuckles are some of my favorite soup bones. Cows are big, heavy animals - and their knees require plenty of cartilage to support their weight. This cartilage is gold when it comes to stock. As you'll see, with plenty of slow simmering, that cartilage will give way to wonderful, super gelatinous stock. I also enjoy using oxtails. Oxtails are exactly what the sound like - beef tails. The small vertebrae in this cut of meat is full of marrow, and the more delicate nature of those bones makes them more easily broken down and dissolved into their mineral constituents. They also have plenty of cartilage, and the meat tends to be less fatty than the knuckles.

Leftover bones can also be used, but I personally don't have much experience with this. Most beef made in my home is boneless, and I think if I tried to store away more bones in my family's freezer, my mother would store MY bones in the freezer (hopefully next to the ice cream..). I digress.

What You'll Need
5-8 pounds of beef soup bones
1 large onion, sliced
1 carrot
2 leek tops
celery stalk
1 garlic clove
1 shot glass of sherry, wine, or liquor

The How-To

Preheat oven to 375-400F

Place the bones on a lightly greased baking pan. In order to make the stock brown and rich, the bones need to be roasted. Arrange the bones and meat in a single layer for even browning. Sprinkle with sea salt. Even if you don't plan to salt your stock later, add a little salt now. I wish I knew why, but the salt seems to make the bones and meat brown better and makes the stock taste less bland. I find no difference in the saltiness of the finished product, if no more salt is added later - I've just noticed that the salted bones stock has a deeper taste.

Arrange the sliced onions over the meat and bones. While I was still learning the ropes of making beef stock, I learned quickly that roasted onions taste MUCH better in the finished product. They also lend flavor to the meat.

Don't trim the meat! Roasting will melt off a good deal of the fat. You don't want to risk losing precious connective tissue - like the tendon I'm holding here - which adds so much texture to the stock.

Pop the pan in the oven, and allow the meat to brown on one side for about 25 minutes.

After about 25 minutes, flip the bones and meat over. Note that some parts of the bones are still bloody - this is OK! The bloody parts will continue to cook even when flipped over.

This is what the bones should look like when finished: dark tan with dark brown parts, with dark brown juicy meat.

The onions, which will go into the stockpot with the meat and bones, should be soft and just a little brown on the edges.

After draining the fat into a gravy separator, use a shotglass full of liquor, wine, or sherry to deglaze the drippings from the pan.

What I like to do is to add the liquor, pop the pan back into the oven for two or three minutes to heat it up, and then to use a brush to scrape up all of the parts stuck to the pan. These drippings are really, really flavorful and its awful to let it go down the drain with the dishsoap when it could be in the stock pot!

The bones I got were not very fatty at all. This creamer contains all of the fat from the entire pan. Someone should really make a miniature shotglass-sized gravy separator! After letting the layers settle, I drained the fat very slowly and put the dark brown drippings on the bottom into the stock pot.

As seen in my Roasted Chicken Stock tutorial, I save the tough, barely-edible green stems from my leeks to use in stock. Leeks are huge, and only a third at most of them is tender and tasty to eat as a side dish - put the rest to good use!

Ugh, celery. I dislike celery in chicken stock because I feel that it easily overpowers the chicken flavor, but I must admit that it's necessary in beef stock. I usually only use a single stock; in this case, I used a half-eaten core of celery from the bottom of the fridge. It was old, no longer perfectly crisp and good for eating alone - but the flavor was fine for stock.

Like with the celery, I use past-prime carrots in stock. This carrot was long forgotton in the crisper, was especially bendy with cracked skin..but its still a carrot, and its still useful for stock. I slice them vertically and throw them in.

Cover the meat with a few inches of water; its all right if the veggies poke out, especially if you're lazy like me and do not chop your veggies when making stock. Set the stove on medium-low, start to simmer, and leave it alone. Skim scum as needed.

Unfortunately..this is the only progress picture I have. I let this stock simmer for 36 hours -a habit I'll have to keep, since this stock turned out wonderfully. I didn't mean to do this, but I happened to be right in the middle of the school week from Hell, peppered with all-nighters, science papers, and crying over chemical calculations gone wrong. I admit it: I forgot about my stock, and its probably the best thing I've ever unintentionally done in the kitchen.

At the end of Hell Week, I put the pot (bones, veggies, fat and all) into the fridge before falling asleep for 15 hours. I woke up to this: completely solid, gelatinous, deep brown stock. Not too much fat. Plenty of flavor.

If you let the stock gel in the fridge, heat it slightly to make it liquid again. Remove the largest bones first...

...and pour the rest through a corander into a new pot.

The rough product will probably look like this - dark brown, a little cloudy, with tiny globules of fat and cooked cartilage floating.

The vegetable matter strained out of the stock is compostible if you give it a quick rinse to get rid of any excess beefy-ness that may attract pests.

Run the stock through a large-mesh strainer. The mush you'll catch will mostly contain vegetable mush with a little meat and grit (from the cooked, softened bones). This is why you should never give your pet cooked bones - just taste the mush. It'll taste sandy from all of the grit that your pet could choke on.

Follow with a run through a finer strainer. This strainer will catch finer grit and bits of fat. Allow the stock to cool at room temperature.

The bones, after being well-simmered for stock, will feel almost spongy. The cartilage - once firm and rubbery - should mush and mold under a fingernail with the consistency of silly putty.

I like to separate the meat from the bones, cooked connective tissue (now quite soft and edible), and cartilage. Its soft, tender meat - well put to use in a beef barley soup or in a pot pie.

After cooling the stock, use the fine strainer to scoop out the layer of fat that will form on top of the stock. Beef stock tends to be much fattier than chicken stock; take care to remove as much as possible.

Store in the fridge for up to five days, or place in airtight freezer containers and store in the freezer.

Enjoy!

Cream of Mushroom Soup For Two (or three..)

2009-02-11T22:33:00.000-08:00

LOOK AT THIS WASTE:

One week later, come new-soup-making time, I was crushed to realize that at least a third of my precious split pea sweet potato soup was still in the fridge. My family is officially sick of soup, and my dear boyfriend C was (un)kind enough to remind me that I was not working very hard at one of my original goals: to make less soup. Less quantity, that is. Its true: I can very easily cook for a dozen or more, but I have troubles when my number of servings dwindle below 5 or 6. This was also a very busy week for me (I work and attend school full time - I'm a few semesters shy of degrees in biochemistry and multidisciplinary sciences. Let's just say that 15 hours of upper division science classes is tough.) So, I decided to see what I had on hand see what small quantity of high-quality soup I could make.

Our fridge was unfortunately lacking, though. I had plenty of cooked chicken but very little stock. Heads of cauliflower, broccoli, and cabbage. Radish greens. Radishes. Condiments. 6 boxes of tofu. Six large button mushrooms. Olive salad from New Orlean's historic central market (my favorite thing ever, and I savor it whenever someone I know passes through New Orleans and buys me a few jars).

What to do?! I was near giving up when I remembered my goal: Less Soup! I figured I could easily stretch my six button mushrooms into a dainty cream of mushroom soup for two.

I was disappointed to read that the common table button mushroom, Agaricus bisporus, is really just an immature Portobello mushroom! I've never been much of a mycologist beyond knowing a few local edible mushrooms, but the idea that petite, cute little buttons could become huge, meaty mushrooms led me to check out several library books, of which the fruits you shall see in a few weeks when I make a more elaborate mushroom -something- post. For today, however, all I have to offer is this: delicious, delicate, creamy mushroom soup for two (or three...I'm trying, I'm trying!!)

What You'll Need
1.5 cups sliced button mushrooms
1/3 cup diced white onion
1 garlic clove, mashed
2 tablespoons butter AND/OR
Extra virgin olive oil
1.5 cups chicken broth *v
2 cups heavy cream *v
1 tablespoon corn starch, dissolved in 1/3 cup cold water
1 bay leaf
salt

Portobello mushrooms will do fine in place of button mushrooms. The soup will be "meatier" but the taste is similar. Use fresh mushrooms - dried mushrooms have a funny texture when reconstituted, and canned/jarred always taste pickle-y to me, even if the mushrooms are not pickled or marinated in vinegar.

If veganizing, use a mild vegetable broth that does not taste heavily of celery. Instead of heavy cream, I'd try unsweetened soymilk mixed with roux.

The How-To

With the bottom of your chef's knife, smash the garlic out of its skin with the heel of your palm (be careful not to cut yourself!). After removing the skin, smash the garlic a little more and chop it so that its not just one large piece of garlic mush.

In a nutshell: dice your onions and slice your mushrooms. I prefer chunky mushroom soup, with plenty of bite-sized mushroom pieces, but feel free to dice the mushrooms or run them through a food processor. If you decide to go with smaller mushroom pieces, reduce the time that you saute them.

Lightly brown the onions in olive oil or butter over medium heat. When the onions are just browned and turning translucent:

..add the mushrooms! I suggested using butter because I personally prefer the way mushrooms taste when they soak in butter while cooking. I cooked my onions in olive oil, then added a pat of butter before adding the mushrooms. Adding olive oil will afford you a little burn-resistance against burning your butter, but still keep an eye on the butter for over-heating and browning.

Add your bay leaf right now!

When the mushrooms are soft, add the chicken stock. I let the small amount of stock and mushrooms simmer for a few minutes, to let the flavors mix. I also added a small amount of salt at this time.

Add the cream! Lower the heat to "low" - the cream can and will burn.

Prepare the corn starch in cold water (the water MUST be cold in order for the corn starch to dissolve; DO NOT try to add corn starch straight to your soup! You WILL end up with lumps of mushy, pasty corn starch in your soup). When mixed, add to the pot.

Mix well, heat thuroughly, salt to taste. The soup is done!

I served my soup for two (or three) with chicken, cauliflower casserole, and radish greens with mineral water (San Pellegrino? Psh. I can out-burp you with Topo Chico Agua Mineral any day of the week!). It went with the meal deliciously.

It could have gone well on its own, as my father ate it (his serving was that blasted third serving - two cups of soup beyond my goal of mushroom soup for two). Oh well. The more soup, the merrier and at the end of the day, my family was wishing I'd made gallons for everyone to share and enjoy. You can never win >:(

Enjoy!

Vegan Yellow Split Pea and Sweet Potato Soup

2009-02-03T22:17:00.000-08:00

Peas. Who likes them? They taste "green", pop in your mouth when eaten fresh, look like baby food (and poop..) when cooked and mashed, and they comprise a large part of high school biology thanks to the father of modern genetics, Gregor Mendel, with his 29,000 pea plants. Peas seem to be a food with no happy medium - you love them in any form, or you hate even the sight of them.

I personally don't understand all of the hate. I love everything Pea. Their color, their smells, the flavor. They're cute - perfectly round and soft in their cozy pods. They're pretty, with vibrant, viney plants that produce petite, unique little flowers. They're good for you, too - a mere 100g of fresh steamed peas has over 5 grams of fiber, plenty of vitamin A and B vitamins and vitamin C, and a healthy serving of many important bio-available minerals such as Phosphorus, Zinc, Magnesium, and Iron (a local restaurant with outstanding split-pea soup recommends their soup for anemics!)

Before the 1600's, when eating fresh, immature green peas was "both a fashion and a madness", peas were grown for their dried seeds across Europe and the Mediterranean region. With the modern abundance of canned, frozen, and fresh peas, the humble, cheap, dried pea is often overlooked as too fickle and difficult to deal with. Nowadays you'll most commonly see dried peas sold split to decrease cooking time, and most often you'll find split peas made into various soups.

Every European and North American culture has its own idea of what split pea soup should be. Most uniquely (in my opinion): Australian split pea soup is traditionally served as a "Pie Floater" - with a whole, small meat pie floating in the soup. One of the first processed, ready-to-prepare foods was instant pea soup in a tube/sausage, created in 1867:

Almost universally, pea soup involves ham, salt pork, or sausage. I have not had pea soup in years - since I stopped eating pork. When I set myself up to make split pea soup as part of my 52-Pots-of-Soup challenge, I figured since I was forgoing the pork, I'd go ahead and make the soup vegan as well.

I found beautiful organic yellow split peas at a local market, and was completely enchanted with their color and how fresh they looked compared to the crumbly old green split peas. Incorrectly, I assumed that the yellow peas might be a little sweeter, too- an attribute I was after, since I needed a little something special to make up for the lack of pork (yellow peas, in fact, are not sweeter than green peas; the change seems purely cosmetic). When I thought of throwing in a sweet potato (left over from the unholy amount I bought and stored at Thanksgiving, months ago..), I was a bit disappointed to see that it'd already been done but I was delighted to see how delicious it looked. I was hooked.

What You'll Need

2 cups yellow split peas
1 large sweet potato (preferably an orange variety)
one-half large onion, diced
ground cumin
fresh ginger, grated (1 tablespoon)
nutmeg
cinnamon
salt
white pepper
water or vegetable stock (about 2 quarts)
olive oil
smart balance/earth balance margarine

Yellow split peas are common in health food stores. Green peas may be substituted, but the color of the end product may not be very appetizing (green + orange = ??yuck??). I chose a common Beuregarde orange sweet potato because I think they're sweeter than the random-variety yellow-fleshed varieties I find where I live, but I gander that a light sweet potato could go well with green peas to avoid nasty-looking soup.

I couldn't remember which version - smart or earth - was vegan and since I used the last of it in the house, I also can't remember which version we had when I cooked this a few days ago!

The How-To

Start by peeling the sweet potato. Trim off any eyes or dents, and slice into half-inch-wide slices. Then chop each slice into halves or thirds.

Rinse and sort the peas. Remove any brown peas or floating peas or pea-plant-parts. Drain, and place in the pot with the sweet potatoes.

Before covering with water, add about a quarter teaspoon of cumin, a quarter teaspoon of salt, and a quarter teaspoon of white pepper. I also chose to add a tablespoon of sugar.

Cover the peas with about one inch of water (the potatoes will float).

Set the oven to moderate heat, cover the pot, and allow the peas and potatoes to simmer. This picture was taken after about 30 minutes - the potatoes are edibly tender, and the peas have the texture of raw, mature beans (in other words: they're still pretty darn hard). They've absorbed water, though, and have expanded. Those green bits are a few wayward green split peas that fell in..

Stir the concoction occasionally to avoid burning. Add water as needed to keep the potatoes just covered.

After one hour. The potatos are soft, and the peas are the texture of cooked pinto beans. Turn off the heat, and allow it all to cool and absorb more water.

Add more water if necessary - with these, the peas were remarkably thick, with the consistency of refried beans. There is no way I could have called this "soup"!

Carmelize the onions: dice the onions, heat olive oil on medium-low heat, and cook the onions slowly. Toss the onions frequently enough to avoid excessive browning. Add a teaspoon of sugar if you used a white onion or a particularly strong onion. Good carmelized onions should be transparent-brown, savory, and should not have any burned or stiff bits. It should take about 30 minutes to carmelize a half onion.

I chose to make the onions separately because 1.) I thought adding carmelized onions to the soft peas and potatoes would impart more flavor than cooking the peas and potatos in water poured over already-carmelized onions and 2.) I forgot. It ended up working well!

Add the carmelized onions to the soup and blend. If using a conventional blender: ONLY fill the pitcher half-full to avoid splattering and burns.

The finished product should be smooth, creamy, and thick. "Thick as pea soup" doens't even begin to describe how thick this soup ended up being. I enjoyed it, but if you prefer a lighter soup, feel free to add a bit of water, stock, or (soy) milk to thin it out.

But, if you're like me, you like thick soup. Truly amazing pea soup can hold a spoon upright! (OK, I cheated - the soup pictured is chilled, but its still an amazing feat!)

I have no final picture of my pea soup, because my nephew and little helper ended up proving to be a distraction. I was tickled with disbelief when I read an old book that said "Children seldom disagree with pea soup, and it seldom disagrees with them" - but indeed, that line held true, as my nephew thoroughly enjoyed six whole spoonfuls before deciding that playing with pea soup is more fun than eating it.

I liked this soup a lot. Its certainly different from the thicker, fattier pea soups I grew up on - rich with salt pork and bacon grease - but it made for a good replacement and a healthy meal.

Hearty Zuppa Toscana

2009-01-26T21:24:00.000-08:00

Before I started this project, my boyfriend had been begging me for a potato soup. He made me promise to make a potato soup in the first few months of Rock the Stock, and when I balked at the idea of making plain old potato cheez, he challenged me to make him a "gourmet" potato soup.

Here is the problem: it has taken me nearly SEVEN years of blood, sweat, and tears to get him to touch vegetables. When we met, my boyfriend (let's call him C) subsisted on turkey hot pockets, omelets, fast food, and canned tomato soup. Thank Goodness for tomato soup - its the only vegetable he saw from age 9 to 18 and I firmly believe that its what saved him from croaking of malnutrition.

I started with potatoes - something he enjoyed, but rarely ate, and even more rarely ate fresh (potato flakes, anyone?) . Through our teen years and his first few years of living on his own, I managed to sneak in carrots and corn. I learned how to cook soul-food so that I could make delicious collard greens and sweet potato pie the way his Grandmommy did - just to coax him into taking a bite. My hard work payed off, I guess - around our fifth anniversary, C calmly and rationally took a bite of an arugula spring mix salad that came with a fancy meal we'd ordered (to be honest, I was a little ticked. I was used to having double portions of salad when we ate out!).

I digress, but you get the idea. Its taken a very long time for C to unlearn all of the bad habits he was raised in, and his health has taken a complete turnaround - but he's still picky. Anything too "green" tasting was out. Anything with more than a few veggies was out. I knew he'd like a cream soup to disguise any off texture or powerful vegetable taste.

My search brought me to Zuppa Toscana, made popular as one of Olive Garden's signature soups. It was perfect - soft, small potatoes, cream and onions, sausage, and just a hint of green. It fit perfectly, especially since my C has recently started a new job requiring strenuous physical labor. He's a very thin, fit individual and has a racing metabolism, so I thought that this soup would perfectly fit his needs for carbohydrates, protein, fat, and vitamins. Unfortunately for me, this is the sort of recipe that would affirm my need for pants with elastic waists - but as a treat, its wonderful, and with the turkey sausage, the fat is cut in half.

What You'll Need

1 pound spicy Italian-style turkey sausage
3 large russet potatoes, sliced 1/4 inch thick
one half medium yellow onion, diced.
2-3 quarts chicken stock *v
1/2-2/3 cup potato flakes or instant mashed potatoes
3 cups fresh baby spinach
3 cloves garlic
butter/olive oil
Italian seasoning (rosemary, basil, oregano, parsley, thyme)

Recipes I've checked out use conventional pork sausage and bacon, but I do not eat pork. I found a delicious Italian turkey sausage at Whole Foods, and have seen Italian turkey sausages by Jennie-O at the supermarket. If you cannot find anything, just flavor ground turkey with italian seasonings, paprika, and a little chili.

I did not bother with turkey bacon in lieu of pig bacon because in my experience, turkey bacon is not good in recipes. Its a great substitute with eggs and biscuits and on BLTs, but when boiled and overcooked its gets a bland, flat, rubbery texture. Since its so lean it does not leave any flavorful grease - so in my opinion, it was just not worth the effort.

I did not peel the potatoes before using them - I just scrubbed them well.

I used baby spinach because spinach is what Olive Garden uses and because I knew already that C enjoys soft baby spinach. Bunched spinach, kale or swiss chard, pulled from the tough stems and chopped, will also do. I also think that mustard or turnip greens would go well with the spicy sausage as well.

Nearly any vegetable stock will substitute well with chicken stock. I've seen many meatless Italian "sausages", but have not tried any. If you try one, please leave me feedback in a comment!

The How-To

Begin by browning your sausages until they are no longer pink inside. Instead of slice the sausage, I squeezed the meat out of the casing to form bite sized balls. Add splashes of water or stock (or liquor!) once in a while to deglaze the spicy-sweet drippings.

When finished, set the sausages and the juices aside. Wash your pot if its especially glazy and brown (I don't recall this being a problem with pork sausage while I still ate pork, but my pot was very sticky after using the turkey sausage)

Next, sautee your diced onions and mashed garlic cloves until transparent in butter or olive oil. If using bacon, fry the bacon first, then cook the onions in the bacon grease.

Once the onions are ready, add your stock! I used too much. 2 quarts should suffice. Bring the stock and onion mixture to a boil...

and add your potatoes! Cook the potatoes until fork-tender.

Once the potatoes are ready, add the sausage and reduce the heat to a low simmer to reheat the sausage and to mix the flavors.

C greatly enjoys very thick, creamy soups. I wasn't about to dump an entire quart of cream into the soup just for him, so I thickened it with potato flakes. Sprinkle in the flakes slowly while stirring to avoid clumps.

After mixing in the potato flakes, slowly add one cup of cream. Add less cream if you notice your soup looking too thin or too white. Turn off the heat.

After the soup stops simmering, add a few handfuls of greens.

Stir gently and be patient - the greens will wilt themselves into the soup. If making a large pot, consider leaving the soup "naked" to avoid mushy greens on Day 2 or 3 of leftover Zuppa Toscana. When serving individual bowls, place the desired amount of greens at the bottom of the bowl, serve the soup on top, and stir right before eating.

Serve in small bowls with cheese on top and fresh spinach as a garnish.

C thuroughly enjoyed this soup - something surprising, since I thought I may have gone overboard by combining onions with greens. Alas, he loved it and licked the bowl and asked for more even though he was filled by the first thick, hearty bowl.

Enjoy!

2009-01-24T20:51:00.000-08:00

I'm bad at this already. Technical difficulties and soup failures have thwarted me this time - but expect a real update tomorrow with a new recipe with a non-failure soup and plenty of pictures!

Roasted butternut squash soup with leeks and ginger

2009-01-15T19:33:00.000-08:00

I prefer to make squash and pumpkin soups with sweet chicken stock, made with plenty of carrots, apple peels, squash butts, and warmer, sweeter spices like nutmeg and cinnamon. I'd planned to make such a stock and soup in a few weeks, but while shopping I spotted beautiful, nearly overripe butternut squash on sale for .75c a pound. I was planning on a different soup to go with the oniony, aromatic stock I made a few days ago - but I figured I'd give a savory butternut squash soup a try. After all, part of the reason I started this endeavor and blog was to shake things up and not get too comfortable using my old recipes over and over.

Butternut squash, or butternut pumpkin to our Australian friends, is a sweet, nutty winter squash with beige-yellow skin and orange flesh that becomes softer and deeper orange when ripened completely. Its a really neat little squash - not as sweet as pumpkin, but lacking the stringy texture of other squash. Its a good source of vitamin C, magnesium, potassium, and fiber. Like most orange veggies, it is rich in vitamin A due to beta-carotene. Beta-carotene is the reason Mom always told you to eat your carrots "so you can see in the dark!": while carrots and orange squash and sweet potatoes won't afford you the ability to see in the dark, they ARE important for eye health. In fact - a symptom of vitamin A deficiency is reduced night vision. A mere ounce of Butternut squash packs in 62% of your recommended daily allowance of vitamin A.

Most squash and pumpkin soups you'll find are pretty darn sweet, calling for sweet onions, boiled squash, and maple syrup or honey. This would not go with the stock I had on hand, but I had a few tricks up my sleeve.

What You Need:

one 3-4 pound butternut squash
2-3 quarts chicken stock *v
one leek
one small yellow onion (about 2/3 cup)
one half cup sour cream *v
extra virgin olive oil
one tablespoon Agave nectar OR
one tablespoon sugar
one teaspoon fresh ginger, grated OR
one half teaspoon powdered ginger
cinnamon
nutmeg
cloves

When picking a butternut squash, pick one that feels heavy for its size. It should be very firm - firmer than a Jack-o-Lantern pumpkin, and much firmer than summer squashes such as zucchini and yellow squash. Pick one with unblemished, creamy manilla-folder-colored skin.

Use a regular, cheap yellow onion; there is no need to buy the sweetest available.

*v - If you would like to make this soup vegetarian, pick a vegetable stock that does NOT have heavy celery or tomato notes. If your vegetable stock even remotely tastes like V8, don't use it! I tried mashing some of my squash into the veggie stock I had on hand and it did NOT mix with the V8 taste well at ALL.

If you are avoiding dairy, try using plain, unsweetened soy/rice yogurt or soured/fermented soy milk. I used sour cream on a whim to add a little thickness, creaminess, and tang to the soup, so anything creamy and probiotic will do. If you use this option, I'd use less stock to avoid making the soup too watery. Feel free to email me any feedback about this at rock.the.stock@gmail.com!

The How-To

Preheat your oven to 375F

Start by peeling your Butternut squash. Don't worry about the butt and the top - they're going to be chopped off and not used (put them in a freezer bag for a future stock!Cut your squash in half just over the bulb on the bottom. Be careful, especially if you've picked yourself a fat squash! I'm not responsable for any lost fingers.

Also: if you have very sensitive skin, are allergic to raw pumpkin, or are prone to contact dermatitis, use gloves to handle your raw squash. The juice is a potential irritant and is known to cause dermatitis flares.

Cut the top half into thirds, and then into 1-inch-wide strips (not pictured). Cut the bulb in half lengthwise, and scoop out the seeds and pulp. The seeds are too small to effectively roast and eat, and the pulp isn't good for stock, so just compost it.

Cut the scooped-out-squash bulb into chunks, and lay on top of foil on a cookie sheet. Lightly salt the squash, and top with a little bit of nutmeg. Be sure to use foil or parchment! These babies like to ooze sticky, sugary squash juice when roasted, and that stuff is impossible to scrub off. Bake them in an oven preheated to 375F for 45-60 minutes, or until soft and a deep orange-gold

Leeks are dirty little veggies - as leeks grow, sand is trapped in the layers of leaves. Prepare them by slicing the leek down the middle, white root to tender light green midsection -

-and rise under cool water. Spread the leaves gently with your fingers. Feel free to soak after chopping, too, if you happen to have gotten an especially dirty leek.

Slice the leek into pieces 1/4 of an inch thick or thinner. Chop the onion. Heat a 4-6 quart pot with plenty of olive oil. Butter may be substituted, but I used oil to cut on the cholesterol and for the flavor - butter would tip this soup towards "sweet", which I was not going for.

Cook the leeks and onions on medium heat for about two minutes. Add a ladle full of stock, and allow the onions and leeks to cook in the liquid for 5-10 minutes over medium-low heat.

Think you can't afford nice extra-virgin olive oil? Hit up your nearest Mediterranean, Middle Eastern, or Arabic grocery. Olive oil is a staple in these regions; I've found that even lower-mid-priced olive oil from these groceries taste as good as lower-high-priced dipping olive oils from gourmet groceries.

Once the leeks and onions are soft enough to mash with a fork, add your roasted squash. Try to resist eating the squash as is, OK?

Just barely cover the squash with stock. Truth be told - I used too much in this picture, and had to remove some while I was pureeing the soup. Add less than is pictured! Let the squash peek out of the stock. You can always add more later.

Simmer with the stock for 10 minutes.

After simmering, blend. Preferably with a hand blender, as pictured. Hand blenders are a great, small investment - they're easy to clean, powerful, and are super-portable. If you must use a conventional blender, blend in small batches (fill the pitcher no more than half way), and allow the steam to vent to avoid dangerous steam build up.

At this point, add the sour cream, agave nectar/sugar, and spices to taste. I used approximately 1/8 teaspoon of each spice listed. I added the ginger on a whim because something was missing (and ginger was it!). I used a few dashes of ginger powder and a few slices of leftover pickled sushi ginger. Next time, I'll plan on using fresh only. The ginger really serves well to connect the sweet squash with the aromatic onions and leeks and the savory chicken broth.

Your finished product should be gold, thick, and creamy. Mix your ingredients with the blender - the more you blend, the creamier the soup. My soup was so creamy that my texture-terrified boyfriend enjoyed it.

I ate this soup with a side of tabbouleh on the first night, and next to steak the next. Its a heavy, warming soup and can be eaten alone, but is a wonderful side and I think it'd go well on top of a nice bowl of homemade mashed potatoes. I consider my mission to make a savory, not-too-sweet Butternut squash soup accomplished!

Enjoy!

Roasted Chicken Stock

2009-01-13T20:49:00.001-08:00

No, I'm not weaseling my way out of a recipe by posting about stock. I'm giving a heads up - my next few weeks of soup will require chicken stock, or an appropriate substitute - and since this blog is all about using homemade-from-scratch ingredients, I figured it'd be a good idea to share my take on chicken stock.

They say that "Good broth will resurrect the dead," and that "Broth to a cook is voice to a singer". "They" couldn't be more right. If you've never taken the time to make your own stock and cook with canned, boxed, or (oh no!) cubed stock, you're in for a treat. Stay home this Sunday. Relax in your PJs and read while it simmers and scents your home.

In addition to just being really, really yummy, making stock at home is an excellent way to "go green". Those boxes, cans, and cubes of stock take a lot of energy and resources to produce, and those who cannot compost usually end up throwing their vegetable waste into the trash or down the drain. Those who cook chicken on a regular basis dump pounds and pounds of valuable nutrition into the trash, thinking that bones are useless. What waste!

If you can boil water, you can cook broth. If you have a freezer, you can collect goodies for broth. It annoys my family, but every chicken bone we eat from is saved in my bone bag in the freezer. It grates my mother's nerves, but I save every tomato and squash butt, carrot top and carrot peels in veggie bags in the freezers (I guess my stock-stash takes up a lot of room..well worth it, in my opinion!)

More Than "Dem Dry Bones"

The best cooked bones to save for chicken stock are from roasted or rotisserie chickens. I've found that fried chicken bones make for greasy, unsavory stock that tastes like old fry batter. All bones are useful - legs, wings, necks, carcasses. Long bones have plenty of cartilage, full of velvety gelatin, and have the most nutritious, calorie-rich marrow inside. The thinner ribs and more porous vertebra easily release their minerals and marrow, becoming extremely soft when simmered long enough. Wings are laden with connective tissue, also rich with gelatin.

When simmered, bones release all of this hidden nutrition: bioavailable minerals such as calcium, phosphorus, magnesium, and sulphur, and marrow, a good source of protein high in monounsaturated fats, known to decrease levels of bad LDL cholesterol. Ever wonder why cats and dogs love bones? You guessed it - they instinctually know that bones are good for their teeth and bodies.

(NEVER EVER give your pet cooked bones! Cooked bones splinter easily and are a choking risk; they also don't excite that I-Love-Bones instinct the way raw bones do. If interested in feeding your dog or cat bones, please google "raw diet for dogs" and "raw diet for cats".)

If you debone your chicken before cooking it, feel free to save those raw bones in the freezer

The How-To

To make chicken stock, you need proportional amounts of:

chicken bones
raw chicken pieces
vegetable scrap
bay leaves
spices

Yup, that is it.

Granted - its good to make stock in large batches, and most chefs swear by "Mirepoix" - an aromatic combination of onion, carrot, and celery - but when worst comes to worst, most veggies will do. Use your common sense. Learn to eyeball things. Figure out which tastes go together and which should not be mixed.

This stock will not be pristine white gold, cooked with perfect proportions and with proper technique. No, this stock will not win approval with fine, discriminating French chefs. No, this stock will not taste like the salty water you buy in cans and boxes (thank goodness!!). Yes, I can guarantee that you and your family will approve. I will post recipes for different stocks of varying qualities and varieties as they are needed. For now, good, wholesome, roasted chicken stock will do the trick.

And yes - if you don't have the time, canned or boxed broths will do, but let's try to ditch those salty, msg-laden cubes.

Begin with a pot. Pick one that your bones will cover the bottom of. If you have very few bones, use a 4 or 6 quart pot. I would not bother to make stock in smaller quantities.

I used a 16-quart stock pot to accommodate my gallon-sized baggie of cooked chicken bones.

These bones were between 2 months and 2 days old. They will keep in the freezer for up to 4-6 months. They may get frosty, but they're still good!

I also threw in a fresh, never-frozen rotisserie chicken carcass. Yes, it was one of those grocery-store-bought rotisserie chickens. They're spiced wonderfully where I buy them and they make wonderful stock.

I also included 5 skinless chicken thighs with bones. Always include some raw chicken/bones - cooked bones have less cartilage, fat, and a different flavor. Raw bones will ensure that your stock has plenty of gelatin and a lighter flavor.

If you're the type to de-bone raw chicken before cooking it, feel free to save your raw bones just for stock!

I save hard, stiff leek greens in the freezer. I don't like them much, preferring the white and pale green parts for stewing - but the dark green is perfectly flavorful and aromatic. I use leeks in exchange for celery for mirepoix. I used 2 leftover leek stalks.

Half of a large yellow onion. Chopping them into quarters is fine - no slicing or dicing necessary. Use twice as much onion as you do carrots:

I included one whole carrot. Use more or less, depending on how savory or sweet you want your stock. Leftover carrot peels are put to good use here!

Hey, look what I found! These were left over from New Years' Menudo, where we only used the green bits. They're wrinkled and wouldn't be very tasty fresh - but they're perfect for simmering and flavoring stock!

Garlic! Throw it in, skin and all. Like carrots and yellow onion skins, garlic skins will add a bit of color to your stock.

White pepper is best - its ground finer and disappears into the broth - but I didn't have any on hand. Spices I used included dried parsley, garlic powder, and three bay leaves. Bay leaves are expensive, but are well worth the investment - they last forever and taste wonderful. You can buy them at a fraction of normal supermarket costs at Indian, Arabic, and Mediterranean groceries.

By the time you're ready to get simmering, your ingredients should fill your pot about two-thirds full. My chicken stock mixes usually consist of 3 parts bone and meat to 1 part vegetables. Adjust your vegetable scraps accordingly to your recipe and according to what you have - I had a lot of onions and leeks hanging around, so this stock is going to end up in heavy, aromatic soups. A future stock for a future recipe will contain plenty of apple and carrot, as it is going to end up in a squash-based soup intended to be a little sweet. Stick to a plain, by-the-book mirepoix for general-use chicken stock.

Cover your ingredients with cold water. COLD WATER. Yes, COLD. It must be cold! Warm water makes for cloudy broth, and serves to "seal" bones so that all of the goodness inside cannot get out the way it should. This is one rule you should always remember.

Place your stock pot on low, low heat and bring to a low simmer. The temperature of the water needs to increase gradually, lest the stock become cloudy and the bones seal. The low heat and long cook time is probably why no one makes homemade stock anymore. This picture was taken after an hour and a half - the water is just starting to become gold, the onion is barely soft, and the leeks are still stiff.

During the next several hours, check the stock periodically to ensure that it is not above a simmer and to skim fat and scum. This is important - left too long, scum dissolves back into the broth, making it bitter and cloudy.

Here, the stock has been cooking for four hours. The onions are as soft as ripe plums, the leeks are soft, and the carrots would make for great baby food. You can continue cooking the stock for longer, if you like. I continued for at least another hour and a half.

This is the raw, early product. Its a deep, rich gold with greenish tones thanks to all of that leek. Because I skimmed the scum and fat regularly, there is not much fat, and what little is there is clear-yellow and light. This is still good to eat! If you're feeling lazy and not up for straining, use stocks like this for heavier, rugged soups. I ate this bowl of stock with a little bit of salt to taste and the garlic that I fished out of the stock pot. I mushed up the garlic and had myself delicious, impromptu garlic soup !

This is the raw, nearly-finished product in the pot. As you can see, it still needs work. There are bones and vegetables in there, and bits of chicken are floating around. You know your stock is good when all of your veggies are so cooked that they've sunk.

Let your stock cool before trying to strain it!

I ladle my stock through a colander into a large stainless steel bowl. Its proper to pour the whole thing through cheesecloth, but I don't have the space.
I follow up with double-straining the stock through rough and fine meshed strainers, to get out the last bits of spice, vegetable, and chicken.

After letting your stock cool a little more, skim more fat off - or, if you'd like, put your cooled stock in refrigerator containers, refrigerate overnight, and then skim off the solidified fat (leave a little bit for flavor!)

This should be your finished product - golden-crystal-clear, light, flavorful stock. Depending on how many roasted bones, raw bones, and cartilage in your mix, it may or may not pass the Refrigerator Test - that is, it may or may not gel when cooled. Mine took on the consistency of corn syrup when cooled, but did not gel. It still has a wonderful mouthfeel and is suitable for almost any recipe requiring chicken stock.

Have fun! The recipe to be posted tomorrow (or the day after..) will require chicken stock, so get simmering!

Menudo - at long last.

2009-01-07T19:13:00.000-08:00

Folks, I fail. I've had serious technical difficulties with my stupid camera card and I really, really didn't want to post without my lovely Menudo pictures. I've managed to retrieve most of my pictures, and got a new camera card - so, its posting time! Hopefully I won't be so lame in the future.

So. Menudo.

If you already know what Menudo is: please don't run from my blog screaming!

And, as a disclaimer: No, veggies, I did not forget you and I'm not going back on my promise to try to veg*nize my soups..but for this recipe, I'm just not bothering. It would not be a simple substitution or procedure to make this recipe meat-free. I did find a few interesting articles and recipes for veg*n "Menudo" (i have a problem using traditional, ethnic names for foods that so very greatly change the traditional recipe..) and will very likely make my own veg*n menudo sometime in the next few weeks!

About Menudo

In pre-revolutionary Mexico, poverty was widespread and meat was prized. Nothing ever went to waste. Menudo was born from this humble hunger. Where higher-class citizens would take the choice meats, peasants were often left with offal and the undesireable bits - organs, feet, tails, neck pieces, heads (yum, barbacoa!!).

Let's face it. Offal is kind of gross. It can be stinky, fatty, tough, and ugly. Organs are hard to clean and tend to have unfamiliar textures. Feet, tails, and heads sport little meat in favor of cartilidge, connective tissue, and bone. If this weren't a soup blog, I'd brag of my (mis)adventures making homemade steak-and-kidney pie, chicken livers, tripas and tongue (yes, tongue) - but I'm trying hard to stay on topic ;)

How on earth can anyone make these foods palatable? Well - the peasants of early Mexico fought the ick factor attached to white, tough cow stomach lining by simmering the chewy innards over a low fire for hours. Chopped onions, added in the beginning of the simmering process, helped to soften the meat. Fresh and dried chiles were added to the soup for flavor, along with spices such as oregano, epazote, and cilantro. In Menudo rojo (red), commonly made in Chihuahua, Mexico and its border state, Texas - tomatoes or tomato paste was sometimes added with the chiles, which imparted the red look. Menudo blanco (white or clear) , common in the north west of Mexico, had no chiles added, or only had tiny, unripe green chile pequins. Menudo verde (green) was made by adding pureed green chiles that had been roasted and peeled. Menudo rojo is the most common version in the U.S., and is the variety I made this past New Year's eve.

I started with:
5 pounds honeycomb tripe
3 pounds beef knuckle, 50% bone/50% meat
1 large onion, diced
4 cloves garlic, chopped
3 dried ancho chiles
1 fresh ancho chile
2-3 chipotles
1 large fresh chile poblano
24oz can golden hominy (about 2 cups)
4oz can tomato paste
1 teaspoon salt
epazote
oregano
majoram
garlic powder
fresh cilantro or parsley
fresh lemons and/or limes

About the ingredients:

The tripe you buy must be labeled "Honeycomb tripe". The offal used in menudo is not really tripe, or small intestines - it is stomach lining. It is a pale, creamy white and looks fatty, but feels firm to the touch when raw. One side of the honeycomb tripe will have the characteristic honeycomb pattern. I wouldn't try to make this with regular tripe. When buying your tripe, try to avoid the frozen blocks of the stuff (likely unavoidable up north or in non-Hispanic areas, but try your best!). Honeycomb tripe is often sold fresh in vaccum packs. Try to find a pack that feels firm and looks like it contains large pieces.

Traditionally, pig's or calf's foot is used, but I do not eat pig and calf foot was not available at my market (and if its available at your's and you're not in a heavily Hispanic area, I'll eat my hat!) . Any beef or pork soup bone will do. I chose beef knuckle because it was cheap, meaty, and because the knuckle (aka leg joint) is covered in wonderful cartilidge that imparts gelatin into the broth. Gelatin is what gives meat-based brothy soups that delightfully silky, almost thick mouth feel. The true test to good soup is the Refrigerator Test. If it goes into the fridge liquid and comes out a gelatinous solid - its really, really good!! When selecting your soup bone, select one that has plenty of bone and plenty of meat attached. The meat can be added to the soup and goes well with the tripe. Use a fresh, raw soup bone - don't use a leftover baked ham or rib bone for this project.

I suggest using a plain yellow onion, but a white onion will do. Avoid purple or very sweet onions. The fresh garlic can be substituted with the minced jar variety - use about two tablespoons.

The chiles are the important part, and is the part that I believe you should not skimp on. Dried chiles run a scary price per pound - upwards of $8/lb! - but relax. You only need a few, they're light, and they last for ages. I spent a grand total of $4 on chiles - and most of my expense was sacrificed on the wonderful, fragrant chipotles. I admit it - I was intimidated by the huge mound of black gold in the produce section, nestled between the corn husks and bags of masa corn meal. So, I asked a nice old lady what to do. (Just a note - I live in south Texas! Making menudo for the new year is a HUGE tradition here, so there were throngs of Hispanic housewives and grandmothers picking up menudo fixings. I promise I don't randomly ask strangers for cooking advice!!) She gave me suggestions on how many to buy, which chiles were best to pick, and told me her secret ingredient was dried, smoked chipotles.

Skip on canned chiles if at all possible. When picking fresh chiles, pick chiles that are plump and shiny, firm and cool to the touch, and that feel light for their size. When picking dried chiles, look for glossy, crinkled chiles that do NOT crumble if you pinch them. You should be able to hear seeds rattle inside.

The How-To

Unravel the tripe! Its big! Its white! Its hard! It smells weird!

Yes, its hard to believe that this huge lump of..stuff..will soon be delicious soup. Prepare a cutting board, ladies and gents - and make sure its the biggest board you own. Sharpen your chef's knife, too - honeycomb tripe is gummy and tough when raw.

Put the tripe into a large colander and rinse the entire thing in the sink. Its going to be huge, if you picked a good batch. I used kitchen shears to slice it in half for managability.

When its well rinsed, plop it onto your cutting board. Try to make the section you're working on as flat as possible. Remember - you're working with a piece of stomach, here. Weird grooves and dips and turns are to be expected.

Cut away the flattest parts and set them aside. I dislike cooking with the folds and grooves - my picture was eaten by my camera card, but you'll know them when you see them. In an expanse of flat, half-inch-thick tripe you'll notice the characteristic bends and folds and fusions where the tripe is thick, muscley, and doubled over. These parts usually end up tough, so I left them out.

Once you have the flat parts ready, slice them into pieces no larger than 1inch by 1inch. Nobody likes slurping up a giant piece of tripe out of their soup, and guests may be embarrassed to ask you for a fork to eat their soup with if the pieces are not manageable by spoon.

You're probably going to be left with some large chunks of flat , very hard meat. At least 1/4 of my package of tripe was not usable (to my standards).

I used a big, nice cast iron stock pot. When choosing a pot, choose your biggest and best. Before putting the tripe into my pot, I threw in a dash of olive oil, my garlic and onions, and let them caramelize just a bit over medium-low heat. While the tripe was still on the cutting board, I gave the tripe a light layer of salt. Add the tripe, soup bones, more salt, spices (about 2 teaspoons of each), cover with water, and let it simmer over medium heat with a cover for two hours. Be sure to check it several times, especially in the beginning. You'll notice a lot of creamy, brownish skum form on top - skim it regularly, or your stock will end up cloudy and off-tasting. After about one hour, taste-test the broth and add more salt if needed. Don't skimp on the salt in the beginning - it will mask and neutralize any of the unpleasant flavors, draw out the pleasant flavors, and just helps all of the spices and such mix.

After the first two hours, remove the soup bones. Set them aside to pick the meat from. If the meat slides right off and back into the broth - don't worry. Just break it up in the pot. Slice your fresh chiles and add them. For the dried chiles, pop off the stem and remove the seeds and bitter white strings. I put them in broken in half; if you like having small bits of chile in your soup, feel free to break them into tiny pieces first. Add the chipotles whole. Add 1 tablespoon of tomato paste. Cover, and allow to simmer for 2 more hours.

The menudo pretty much cooks itself at this point. Check on it every 20-30 minutes to skim any extra scum or fat, and to adjust the spices. I ended up adding a few tomato-chicken boullion cube because I barely had any tomato paste to begin with, and I like very red, tomato-y menudo.

For the last 20 minutes of simmering, add your can of drained hominy. It does not need to cook for long at all - good Menudo does not have mushy hominy in it.

Serve with fresh cilantro (traditional) or parsley (whoops, I bought the wrong batch of herbs, but it was surprisingly good). A squeeze of lemon and/or lime helps spice up your Menudo. Believe it or not, honeycomb tripe is pretty bland, so it needs plenty of other flavors (like chile, garlic, onion, and citrus) to make it palatable.

After its first trip into the fridge, conduct the Refrigerator test. Your Menudo should be deep red and solid, with a thin layer of orange fat on top.

If your soup is nice and gelatinous, feel free to skim off all of the fat - you don't need it to enhance the taste and mouthfeel. This soup is inherently quite fatty; the stuff on top is really not needed. I removed at least 3/4 of the excess fat. If you can't tell, my Menudo ended up very, very gelantinous. I took the picture too late - my parents had already hit the leftovers, and you can see the giant hole left.

Your Menudo should keep well in the fridge for 3-5 days. Menudo freezes beautifully - place it in a sealed, freezer-friendly container. If you happen to not like your Menudo (it is an aquired, odd taste..), tuck it away for a Menudo-loving friend. Menudo is usually only served in Mexican restaurants on weekends, and it usually flies from pot to bowl to belly by the time lunch rolls around. Any Menudo-deprived person will be grateful for a frozen, homemade serving, though I must admit - I hope that Menudo-deprived person is you! Be adventurous, and enjoy :)

I like soup.

2009-01-02T01:59:00.000-08:00

I like soup.

Soup is such an amazing food - it can warm a chilled body, refresh an overheated body, fill bellies with hearty goodness or simply whet the appetite before more courses are served. Soup comes in all colors - brown, gold, green, red, white, purple, just to name a few. It comes in all flavors - sweet, sour, salty, bitter, or savory. It can be thin, smooth, creamy, chunky, beefy, noodly, fishy, hearty. Soup is medicine. Soup is comfort. Soup is open minded, magical, and free (did I go overboard with that last line?).

I like soup. Being a person interested in whole, natural foods and someone devoted to living a sustainable life, I make soup from scratch more often than your average Joe. With every chicken I roast, I wonder what goodies I can make with the leftover meat and bones. When my celery wilts beyond the point that I would eat it raw, it goes into the freezer to be saved for my next stock. My carrot peels, apple peels, tomato and squash butts and wilted fresh herbs all end up in the freezer in labeled baggies, to be thrown into the next pot of stock for my next pot of soup. I love food, and soup is a food that I love.

For my past few pots of soup, I realized that I repeated recipes a lot. I'd gotten into a soup rut. I also was diagnosed with a genetic disorder that prevents me from ever following a recipe, or writing down what I do, which prevents me from duplicating many soups. This genetic disorder also prevents me from making pots of soup meant to feed less than 15 people. So, too often, I'd end up with a delicious soup that wasn't exactly the same as the last similar delicious soup. And I'd end up with more delicious soup than I could possibly eat - even with hungry parents, hungry siblings and their spouses, and a hungry boyfriend to feed.

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My resolve is this: For the entirety of 2009, I will make a new, unique soup every weekend. No recipe will be repeated, and every detail of the recipes and "enhancements" that I use will be archived here at Rock the Stock. I will also make an honest effort to make smaller portions of soup. My freezer and tupperware will thank me, and I'd like to strip my family of their right to say "But I'm sick of this soup already!" ;)

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I consider myself a conscious eater. I make a big effort to buy organic and to invest in ethical meat that does not come from factory farms. I use real ingredients, as unadulterated as possible, and avoid processed ingredients as much as possible. Give me real butter and cream over margarine and cool whip, fresh and plain frozen veggies over canned, and whole, "inconvenient" raw chickens over boneless skinless (and flavorless..) breasts and frozen chik'n patties.

I am an omnivore, as most humans choose to be, but I don't judge, and as a conscious eater, I've cut my intake of meat down a lot. Many of the recipes I will make and post here will be vegetarian and vegan. I will also include tips on how to substitute animal ingredients where I see them. Remember my genetic disorder (that one about not following recipes..) and stretch your minds. Feel free to substitute that milk with soy, or to add meat to a vegetarian recipe. Its your soup, not mine. Feel free to email me pictures of your soup results and any changes you make to my recipes at rock.the.stock@gmail.com - I'd love to see what you come up with, and if I get enough (or any..) response, I'll post your modifications up here for all to see and learn from.

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I made my first pot of soup for the year on the evening of New Year's eve. An odd day, considering that I hope to make my soups on the weekends, but this soup was special. Yes, ladies and gents - I made the infamous Mexican hangover soup, Menudo, and it was delicious. My adventure in making Menudo for the first time will be detailed here tomorrow, complete with a recipe and pictures.