A Quick Soup for Lunch or Anytime

I have been trying to eat more soup lately, at least for one meal a day. When I’m feeling a little under the weather and rundown, which seems to be the norm this winter, nothing hits the spot like a bowl of soup. Soup is also filling and an easy way to sneak in lots of veggies.

But it can seem like a chore to make a pot of soup, especially in the middle of a busy day. With just a little planning, though, I can turn leftover cooked meat, vegetables, and pasta or rice into a quick soup anytime.

The most important part of the soup is its base, the stock. A rich, satisfying, full-bodied soup requires a homemade stock. Making stock ahead of time is easy to do. Just let a big pot simmer away while doing other things around the house or, better yet, break out the slow cooker. Here is my method for making stock.

I usually make chicken stock on a Sunday afternoon. After cooling it in the refrigerator, I freeze it in two-cup containers. In the evening, I pop a container of frozen stock into the fridge to defrost overnight, and I’m all ready to make a bowl of soup for lunch the next day. (Defrost more containers if cooking for more than one person.)

When it comes time to make lunch, I compose the soup out of anything I find in the fridge that is either already cooked or will cook quickly. Of course, I make sure that the flavors are well-matched, too. I usually stick to five or fewer ingredients for a simple, nourishing soup. Here are some ideas for what to add:

• any cooked meat, shredded or sliced small
• diced bacon, crisped in the soup pot before adding the stock
• leftover cooked vegetables
• fresh greens, such as spinach or bok choy
• canned or fresh tomatoes, diced
• canned or cooked beans, rinsed
• boiled or roasted potatoes
• cooked pasta or rice

Heat 2 cups of stock per person in a large pot over medium. Add the ingredients and let cook at a low simmer for 10-15 minutes to heat through. Finish the soup with a swirl of olive oil, a pat of butter or a sprinkling of grated cheese, plus salt and pepper to taste. Serve with bread or crackers.

Italian Sausage Soup

It is raining today, and actually feels like fall is coming, so here is a warming soup that is quick and easy enough for a weeknight meal. This is another entry in my favorite recipes series. This soup comes from Sara Foster’s cookbook, Sara Foster’s Casual Cooking.

Italian Sausage Soup

• 2 tbsp. olive oil
• 1 lb. Italian sausage
• 1 onion, chopped
• 3 cups chicken stock
• 1 14.5-ounce can chopped tomatoes with their juices
• 1 15-ounce can cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
• Salt and pepper
• 4 cups spinach, cabbage, or other greens, washed and trimmed
• 4 basil leaves, thinly sliced

Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium-high. Cut open the sausage casings and squeeze the meat into the skillet, discarding the casings. Add the onion and saute 5 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the sausage is light brown all over and the onion is tender and translucent. Drain the fat from the skillet. Add the stock, tomatoes and beans. Season to taste and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for 8-10 minutes. Turn off the heat and stir in the greens and basil.

Patricia Wells’ Double Celery Soup

Over the next several posts, I’m going to be sharing some of my favorite recipes. These are recipes that I don’t make that often but that I want to remember for special occasions. Sometimes when a favorite recipe is buried in a cookbook, it can be forgotten. So my reasons for sharing them on the blog are purely selfish — I just don’t want them to get lost or forgotten over time. But I hope you will enjoy them too.

This first recipe comes from Patricia Wells’ excellent cookbook Bistro Cooking. It combines two ingredients I don’t cook with very often: celery and celery root. This unexpected combination make an absolutely delicious soup that can make an appearance at a dinner party or perk up someone who’s feeling under the weather.

This soup is most appropriate for winter or early spring, so apologies for posting out of season. As a light meal, serve it with crisp crackers and a green salad. It makes 6-8 servings, and leftovers can be frozen.

Double Celery Soup

• 1 med. celery root (about 1 pound), peeled and diced
• 10 celery ribs, cubed
• 3 leeks, trimmed, rinsed and cut into thin rounds
• 1 large sprig of thyme, 3 bay leaves and several sprigs of parsley, tied with a string
• 2 quarts chicken stock
• Salt and pepper
• Handful of fresh chopped herbs for garnish

In a large saucepan, combine the celery root, celery, leeks and whole herbs. Add the stock and season gently. Bring to a simmer over medium-high. Simmer until the vegetables are soft, about 25 minutes. Sprinkle with the chopped herbs to serve.

Super-Simple Chicken Soup with Vegetables and Pasta

I have been trying to eat more soup recently, and not just because it’s winter. There are so many reasons why soup is a great meal that we should strive to eat every day. Soup is easy to make and adaptable to whatever ingredients are available. It’s easy to get a daily serving of veggies in — just throw them in the soup pot. Also, soup is satisfying and filling, a boon if you are trying to eat less and lose weight (which many of us are after the excess of the holidays).

Chicken soup is a classic that everyone loves. I don’t follow a recipe to make this soup, but rather use the vegetables I already have on hand. With small pasta such as orzo or macaroni and boneless chicken breasts, this soup can be prepared in less than 30 minutes.

It’s perfectly okay to use store-bought stock for this soup; I prefer the organic brands, such as Swanson’s or Pacific Natural, which are sold in aseptic containers. However, it is easy to make chicken stock, and it only takes about an hour. Homemade stock tastes much richer than any stock you can buy, so why not make your own?

To make a quick chicken stock, cut up a three- to four-pound chicken and put the pieces in a large pot. Roughly chop 1 large onion, 1 large carrot and 1 celery stalk (don’t bother to peel), and add them to the pot, along with 1 bay leaf and a few whole peppercorns. Pour in 14 cups water. On high heat, bring just to a boil, then reduce to a low simmer. Cook for at least one hour and no more than two hours. Cool slightly and strain out the solids. Reserve the chicken breasts to use in any recipe calling for cooked chicken meat. If you are not making soup right away, refrigerate the stock and use within three days, or freeze it for up to three months.

Now, to make the soup, peel and chop several kinds of vegetables into small pieces. Carrots, celery and onion are classic choices, but use whatever you have available. Heat 1 tablespoon olive oil in a large pot over medium-high. Saute the vegetables to lightly brown them. Add 1 garlic clove, minced, and saute another minute or two. Add 4 cups chicken stock and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium-low. Cut 1 boneless chicken breast into small pieces and add to the pot, or if you made your own stock, shred the cooked breast meat and add that. Also add ¼ cup uncooked orzo, macaroni or other small pasta. Season with salt and pepper. Simmer, covered, until the chicken and pasta are cooked, about 15 minutes.

Turn Leftovers Into Soup

I’ve been trying to eat more soup lately. It’s the season for soup, but it’s also one of the best foods you can eat if you’re trying to lose weight or eat more healthy foods. Broth-based soups fill you up and leave you feeling satisfied without adding a lot of calories. They also are a good way of getting a lot of vegetables into your diet.

Often, I’ll try to make a big pot of soup on the weekend and then freeze the leftovers for lunches. But I have to admit that I don’t often think ahead. I either don’t take the container out of the freezer to thaw in time, or I skip making the soup altogether.

I usually have a lot of cooked vegetables left over from weeknight dinners, though, and I hate to throw food out, but eating reheated vegetables doesn’t always appeal to me. This week, the lightbulb went on. I don’t know why it never occurred to me before to turn those leftover vegetables into soup. All you really need to keep on hand is some stock, which is easy enough to make ahead of time, or you can buy it pre-made (I prefer the kind that comes in the aseptic containers, as those brands seem to have less salt).

All I did was simmer the cooked vegetables with some stock to cover for about 10-15 minutes. Roasted and braised vegetables seem to work best, but any veggies will do. If the vegetables get too soft and mushy, just puree the soup in the blender or with an immersion stick blender, and you have cream of whatever soup. Season well, but make sure the seasonings you add don’t clash with whatever seasoning might already be on the pre-cooked vegetables.

A little grated cheese or a dollop of plain yogurt makes a great garnish. You could also toss in whatever bits of leftover cooked meat there might be, such as roasted chicken or some crumbled bacon. Voila! A quick and healthy lunch is on the table, with very little pre-planning required.

Smooth Gazpacho + Fried Green Tomato BLT

I’m sorry I’ve been so delinquent updating this blog. Summer has gotten crazy-busy, and my only writing time has been severely curtailed ever since my little one got inconsistent about napping. When he doesn’t nap, I don’t get any writing time, so I can’t blog. It’s definitely cut into my productivity.

I cooked my last challenge a couple of weeks ago, but I’m just now getting around to posting it. It’s still seasonally appropriate, though. The challenge was to make a chilled soup, one I hadn’t tried before. I have to admit that I didn’t go very far out on a limb for this one. I made a blended gazpacho.

Usually, when I make gazpacho, it’s pretty much a salad in a bowl. This time, I was inspired by Thomas Keller‘s recipe for Sun Gold Tomato Gazpacho, from Ad Hoc at Home. This soup is blended until it is silky smooth. It has a wonderful mouthfeel that encourages you to keep eating and eating. My husband also loved it. (Although the Kid, as per usual, turned up his nose.)

This soup uses cherry tomatoes, which should be abundant just about now. I was going to take advantage of some wonderful heirloom cherry tomatoes I spotted in the co-op, but by the time I went back to get them, they were all gone. So instead of using the yellow tomatoes that are called for, I substituted red. It didn’t hurt the soup any, so far as I could tell.

I served this with another great recipe from Sara Foster‘s Southern Kitchen: Fried Green Tomato BLTs. I didn’t have actual green tomatoes yet, so I used red ones from the co-op that were still a bit mealy. They fried up great and the sandwich was tasty, although nothing really beats a basic BLT at the height of tomato season. I encourage you to make your own mayonnaise for your BLTs. I stirred in some chopped basil, which gave it a summery taste. Here is my recipe for fool-proof homemade mayo.

Cherry Tomato Gazpacho

Yields: 6 servings (leftovers keep well in the fridge)

• 1 cup cold water
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed and peeled
• ¼ cup coarsely chopped onion
• 2 lbs. cherry tomatoes, stemmed and halved
• 1 cucumber, peeled, seeded and sliced
• 1 red bell pepper, cored, seeded and cut into large pieces
• 2 tablespoons sherry vinegar, or to taste
• ½ teaspoon smoked paprika
• pinch or two of cayenne pepper, or to taste
• salt, to taste
• ¾ cup good-quality olive oil
• 1 tablespoon minced basil, for garnish

1. Reserve 1 cup of the tomatoes, ½ of the cucumber and ½ of the pepper for garnish. Dice the cucumber and pepper. Refrigerate until serving.

2. In a large bowl, add the water, garlic, onion and remaining tomatoes, cucumber and pepper. Let marinate in their own juices for 5 minutes or so. Transfer to a food processor or blender and blend until completely smooth. Strain to remove any larger bits of tomato peel.

3. Return the mixture to the blender or food processor. Add the vinegar, smoked paprika, cayenne and salt. With the blender or food processor running, slowly pour in the oil, blending until very, very smooth. Taste and add more vinegar or seasonings as desired.

4. The gazpacho can be refrigerated up to 2 days. To serve, garnish with the reserved diced vegetables and minced basil leaves.

Adapted from Ad Hoc at Home, p114.

Hearty Asian-style Chicken Soup

This week’s challenge was to make a hearty-style soup, preferably with chicken in it. The twist was that it had to be a kind of soup I don’t normally make, since I make soup just about every week. My husband mentioned pho, as an example, which put me in mind of a hearty, Asian-style soup. That would be change of pace for us, since I don’t usually cook Asian-style dishes.

The result was an Asian-inspired soup featuring slivers of chicken, rice noodles and bok choy. This dish was a hit with everyone. My husband and I both drained our bowls, and even my toddler enjoyed the noodles. (He is not into soups these days.)

While this was a hearty soup, what really made it was the broth, which was packed with flavor. I didn’t have time to make chicken stock from scratch, as I would normally do, so I took some shortcuts. I think the result was just as delicious, and I may make this “shortcut” broth more often than not in the future. I began with Penzey’s chicken stock base, but you could also use store-bought chicken broth. To that I added vegetables, garlic, bay leaf, ginger, cinnamon and cloves. My house smelled terrific while it was simmering! But what really kicked up the flavor was the wine, soy sauce and tomato that went into the broth, which contributed an umami quotient. If you aren’t familiar with the term, umami is the taste of savoriness, found in such foods as tomatoes, soy sauce and Parmesan cheese. That’s why adding a little soy sauce or Parmesan can wake up the flavor of a dish.

The broth imparted its flavor to everything that went into it. Pho is usually made with beef, but we don’t eat beef at home, so I substituted thin slivers of chicken instead. I added rice noodles and bok choy to make the soup more hearty. One small, minced jalapeno contributed a background sensation of heat without being overwhelmingly spicy. A little lime squeezed over the top provided brightness.

This was a terrific soup. I should acknowledge Mark Bittman’s recipe for Hanoi Noodle Soup (in How to Cook Everything, Revised Edition) as the inspiration for the recipe, but I did make a lot of changes to it. I would definitely make this soup again, and the recipe is fast and easy enough to prepare on a weeknight.

For this weekend’s challenge, we are celebrating  March Madness with chicken wings — not something I cook very often. Come back next week for the results.

Hearty Asian-style Chicken Soup

Yields: 4 servings
Time: 1 hour or more, depending on how long you simmer the broth

To make the broth:

Begin with 8 cups water + 1½ teaspoons Penzey’s chicken soup base or 8 cups store-bought chicken broth in a large pot. Add:

• 1 carrot, unpeeled, roughly chopped
• 1 celery stalk with leaves, roughly chopped
• 1 onion, unpeeled, roughly chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, peeled
• 1 canned tomato
• ½ cup white wine
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 cinnamon stick
• 1 inch fresh ginger, unpeeled
• 4 whole cloves
• 1-2 teaspoons five spice powder

Bring to a low boil. Lower the heat, partially cover and let simmer for at least 30 minutes and up to 1 hour.

In the meantime, soak 1 pound rice noodles in hot water to cover until softened, 15-30 minutes. Drain and set aside.

Strain the broth and return to the pot, or use a skimmer to scoop out the solids. Raise the heat a little to bring it to a steady bubble. Add:

• the soaked rice noodles
• ½ pound boneless chicken, cut into thin slices (You could substitute thinly sliced beef or pork, if you like.)
• 1 medium or 2 small heads bok choy, chopped
• 1 small jalapeno, seeds and ribs removed, cut into small dice
• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• A lot of freshly ground black pepper

Cook until the chicken is no longer pink and the cabbage is tender, which should only take a few minutes. Taste and add more soy sauce, if needed. Serve with lime wedges.

Potato Soup, Many Ways

I try to make soup at least one night a week, and potato soup is one of my favorites. It is dead simple to make, either in the slow cooker or on the stovetop if pressed for time, and it can be varied many ways, depending on what vegetable you add. Potato soup is also extremely satisfying on its own or with a green salad and some homemade bread. Here are some of my favorite ways to make potato soup.

Simple Potato Soup

Yields: 4 servings
Time to make: 30 minutes on the stovetop

• 1 tablespoon butter and/or extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 small onion, sliced, or 1 garlic clove, sliced (optional)
• 3 medium potatoes, any type, peeled and cut into small cubes
• Another vegetable, such as: 3 carrots, peeled and cut into small cubes; 2 leeks, washed well, trimmed and sliced; 1 head broccoli florets; 1 bunch celery, trimmed and chopped; or 3 tomatoes, chopped (Also see the variations below.)
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
• 4 cups chicken stock, preferably warmed; water can be substituted in a pinch, but the soup won’t be as hearty

Heat the butter or oil in a large, deep saucepan over medium. Soften the onion or garlic for a few minutes, if using. Add the vegetables. Season with salt and pepper and cook, stirring, for 2 or 3 minutes. Add the stock and cook until the vegetables are very tender, about 20 minutes. (You may prepare the soup in advance up to this point. Cover, refrigerate for up to 2 days, and reheat before proceeding.) If you like, puree the soup with an immersion blender, or you can serve it chunky-style.

It is nice to garnish this soup with grated cheese or fresh herbs, or swirl in a pat of butter or a dollop of sour cream. You can also add ½ to 1 cup cream, milk or half-and-half after pureeing.

To make this soup in the slow cooker: Put all of the ingredients in the slow cooker. Add enough of the water or broth to just cover them. Cover and cook on LOW until the potatoes are tender, 5 to 7 hours.

Peas and Watercress Potato Soup: Just before the soup is done, add the leaves and tender stems of 1 bunch of watercress and 1 12-ounce package frozen petite peas, thawed. When done, puree this soup and serve immediately; it will become dull as it sits.

Potato Soup with Sorrel or Spinach: In Step 2, when the potatoes are quite soft, add 2 cups washed, trimmed and roughly chopped sorrel or spinach leaves. Cook for 2 minutes, then serve, or puree, stir in 1 cup heavy cream, and serve hot or cold.

A Salad or Soup Each Day

Lately, I’ve been trying to incorporate a new practice into my eating: for one meal per day (usually lunch), eat salad or soup. I haven’t always succeeded, particularly on weekends, but for the most part it’s working out.

My goal is two-fold. First, I want to incorporate more vegetables into my diet. Salads and soups usually contain lots of veggies and rely on a small amount of meat or cheese to enhance the flavor. And second, I want to reduce how much I eat. When I eat salad or soup, I generally eat less because greens and broth are so filling. Also, I am compelled to eat slowly, as opposed to wolfing down a sandwich, which means I get full sooner. I usually don’t need bread or other carbs to help me feel full.

When I make soup, I usually make a big pot and freeze single servings to dole out later. Salads are more improvisational, based on what I have in my fridge or pantry at the time. I’ll be posting some of my favorite soups and salads here.

Here is last night’s salad: a Southwestern chicken salad. This isn’t so much a recipe as a blueprint.

Southwestern Chicken Salad

Combine:

• Cooked, sliced chicken (leftover chicken is great)
• Sliced squash, roasted at 400 degrees for 15-20 minutes
• Sliced tomato
• Diced avocado
• Canned kidney beans, drained and rinsed
• Shredded cheddar cheese

For the dressing:

• Juice of 1 lime
• 2 tbsp. red wine vinegar
• ¼ cup olive oil
• ½ tsp. chili powder or to taste
• ½ tsp. cumin or adobo seasoning or to taste
• salt and pepper

I use this recipe to make vinaigrettes, varying the flavors to match the salad ingredients. I like to make a larger batch than I need and keep it in the refrigerator for quick salad making throughout the week. It’s a good idea to have a dedicated salad dressing bottle; here’s one I like, which allows you to remix the dressing just before you use it.

Gazpacho + French Bread

Well, I haven’t been keeping up with my goal of posting daily entries on this blog, have I? The truth is that I haven’t been inspired to write. I’m doing a lot of cooking, but I’m either making tried-and-true recipes that I’ve already blogged about or I’m trying new projects but I don’t feel like posting the recipes for various reasons. Anyway, here’s a sample of what I’ve been cooking lately.

This past week, I made a lot of good stuff, including — after a stop at a roadside vegetable stand — gazpacho. It’s nice to have cucumbers and tomatoes again. Gazpacho is great with lots of garnishes. Try avocado, red onion or homemade croutons. Here is my recipe.

As part of my effort to reduce the amount of packaged foods I buy, I have taken to making my own bread. I have found that Mark Bittman’s recipes (in How to Cook Everything) offer the best compromise on flavor and effort. His recipes all use the food processor — I don’t have a standing mixer — so kneading time is minimal. I made this beautiful French loaf in just one day. This is the kind of bread you can make every day, if you like.

(Photos are courtesy of my husband. He posts them here.)

I may not be posting as much, but I hope you’ll keep checking in.