Tortellini and Shredded Beef in Broth with Vegetables

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The famous Italian dish, Tortellini en brodo, is a beautiful, well-known holiday pasta and broth soup upon which my simplified, shredded-beef American version is based.  I truly didn't have this dish in mind, I just happened to have a pot roast, a bunch of tortellini, and a desire for something besides the things I usually make with pot roast on a cold snowy day: pot roast and vegetables,  beef-vegetable soup, beef-barley soup, beef burgundy, and so on. If you'd like to make the real Tortellini en brodo, visit a blog that has the directions in English; many are in Italian!  Here's a good home-made blogger's  version  (Stefan's Gourmet Blog) that is totally from scratch, including the meat filling for the tortellini, and looks luscious.  If you'd rather have a little video action and a Mario Batali recipe, here's that link.  The simplest shortcut recipe is here.  In other words, you're not cooking meat for broth, bones for stock, or making homemade pasta and filling in my soup, but you are cooking a pot roast!  And while my ingredients' list isn't short, the method is simple and gives you time for other things.  

Chicken-Wild Rice Soup with Butternut Squash and Pecans

WE'VE MOVED! More Time at the Table is now published on wordpress.com!  This blog has been hosted on blogger for the past four-plus years and will be published at both urls for a month or so…or until all the kinks are worked out of the transition process.  Do change your bookmarks or links, please, and follow me here on Word Press:  http://www.moretimeatthetable.com/   Great thanks to my gorgeous daughter Emily who managed the migration.  So cool to have smart kids!

In January it's so nice
While slippin' on the slidin' ice
To sip hot chicken soup with rice
Sippin' once, sippin' twice
Sippin' chicken soup with rice...

--Maurice Sendak, lyrics; music by Carole King:   REALLY ROSIE (click to listen to the music)  Original text from Sendak's book CHICKEN SOUP WITH RICE one book in the Nutshell Library:

As a student in library school, I once was in charge of a weekend seminar about famed children's author, Maurice Sendak.  I had to plan the event from soup to nuts, including speeches, lunches, lodging, etc.  I also had to invite the man himself.  I was flabbergasted when he accepted.  I was near collapse when his assistant called a few days ahead, and citing illness, informed me the author would need to miss this particular conference.  Hundreds of people from miles around were nearly on their way.  Crushing…  But, still--the weekend went on as planned….though we certainly missed the main attraction.  No great matter in the long run, though, I never lost my deep and sincere admiration for the man, nor my love for his sweet lyrics about one of my favorite soups ever.  All of my children heard the Sendak books and we kept the REALLY ROSIE book around until…well, actually I still have it.

Last Gasp Broccoli Soup

I hope your Thanksgiving was all you needed it to be.  Dave and I, having moved back into our Colorado Springs house just last month, were blessed to eat dinner at friends'.  Sean smoked a turkey; I made rolls and pies, as well as a pot of curried Butternut Squash Soup. Jami and Dave made a 4-quart Cauliflower Grantinee.  We ferried it all over to the north side of town, where a gorgeous table and a big group of friends waited.  All we had to do was sit down and enjoy it all.  Thanks, God.  I did bring home some leftovers...and hence this soup.  Enjoy this first week of Advent or the rest of Hanukkah...and make some broccoli soup.

Ina Fridays -- Sides, Soups, and Salads-- Easy Tomato Soup with Grilled Cheese Croutons

Since I'm writing a soup cookbook, I'm always interested in soups others make.  Not only family, friends, and neighbors, but also famous cooks like Ina Garten.  If I'm home and I've been working all day, I'm in front of the tv with my feet up at 3:00 Central Time when Ina makes one of  her appearances on Food Network's Barefoot Contessa.  While doing a little background reading for this post, I discovered this on FOOD NETWORK'S "10 Things You Didn't Know about the Barefoot Contessa":

Lamb Chops in Curried Red Lentil Soup

I am both blessed and cursed to be forced to cook for just me on a regular basis.  My better half has always traveled, and while for years I cooked for the kids and me, the kids are off cooking for themselves now.  These days, it's often just "the babies" and me for dinner.

"The Babies"

Lemon Split Pea Soup with Peppered Sour Cream

 



Split pea is an old love, but I never make it the same way twice.   What's cool about this version is a. the lick of lemon up against the spicy notes and b. texture layers-- i.e. crunchy, seedy tortilla chips and smooth sour cream on top of the soup, which is about halfway pureed. 

50 Women Game-Changers in Food - #46 - Gael Greene - Corn Soup with Sautéed Scallops and Bacon

“Do you sing, too?” I asked, tickling his tweed elbow.

I have a good friend who is fond of this phrase:  "She was born with the words, 'Please peel me a grape,' on her lips."   That could very well have been said about spicy bon vivant Gael Greene (1933-  ), this week's  number 46 on Gourmet Live's List of 50 Women Game-Changers in Food.  Greene, the 40-year New York Magazine restaurant critic and columnist, novelist, and philanthropist from Detroit, is best known for her erotic encounters with food, as well as with the likes of Clint Eastwood and Elvis Presley.   Want details?  It's all (probably not) chronicled in Greene's memoir, the infamous Insatiable : Tales from a Life of Delicious Excess (Grand Central, 2007.)  And while I promise I'm not telling tales out of school, you can listen to her own description of Presley as appetizer here.

50 Women Game-Changers in Food - #41 - Elizabeth Andoh - Udon Soup with Vegetables and Tofu

I'm always on the lookout for beautiful, delicious food that is also healthy.  To say nothing of the delight in making a meal that didn't empty the wallet at the check-out.  Enter this sweet and toothsome goodie, "Udon Soup with Vegetables and Tofu," that's just as far away from your capital T-typical noodle soup as it can get without falling off the edge of the comparison.   Add vegetables, lovingly cut PREE-cisely teensy of course,  a nice slew of tofu, and you're eating a recipe from Elizabeth Andoh, who is number forty-one on Gourmet Live's list of 50 Women Game-Changers.

Living in Japan for for decades,  Elizabeth Andoh attended Yanagihara Kinsaryu School of Traditional Japanese Cuisine (Tokyo), wrote several Japanese cookbooks (scroll down for list), and for years served as Gourmet magazine's Japanese food writer.  She also teaches cooking classes in Tokyo if you're ever out that way.   Most recently, Andoh published Kibo: ("Brimming with Hope)  Recipes and Stories
from Japan's Tohoku...

 

Alyce's Lamb Shanks on Mashed Ginger Rutabaga and Next Day Lamb Stew

I like a pasta bowl for lamb shanks and sides...sit them up in the rutabagas to show them off.

 If you're a bit unsure about lamb shanks... what they are or how to cook them, here's the deal:  they're pretty much like cooking a tiny pot roast on a big old bone.  Whatever treatment you've given beef chuck roast is probably going to work with lamb shanks--which are from way up on the lamb's leg.  Since the meat is tough, it needs to be braised (cooked in liquid) and the braising liquid of choice is often wine, though it needn't be.  A stiff stout would work, as would broth, tomatoes, cider and water...whatever floats your shanks.  Add root vegetables and/or onions, celery, garlic, and you've an entire meal.   Even just onions and wine with a bit of dried rosemary will give you something well worth eating.  Most recipes call for two lamb shanks per person; there isn't a lot of meat on one.  I find that given the vegetables and sauce inevitably cooked with them that one is plenty.

Chinese "BBQ" Pork, Five Heap Noodles, and Wine-Explosion Soup for Chinese New Year

Set your table before you begin cooking.

While I missed blogging Barbara Tropp a couple of weeks ago for "50 Women Game-Changers in Food" from Gourmet Live, it didn't stop me from making some of her incredible food in honor of a good friend's birthday and Chinese New Year.

I started out by spending a bit of cozy time with one of Barbara's books, The Modern Art of Chinese Cooking, just to see what I thought I'd like to make.  The choices were myriad and luscious... but I couldn't make all of them.  I did, however, want to keep reading forever; she wrote beautifully.  I decided on three separate dishes:  one a soup for a starter and the other two as a main course that could be eaten together, but that would also provide some great leftovers.  HA!  There were hardly any leftovers.  Do make extra pork; it's a perfect cold snack.

Homemade Tomato Soup and Fried Cheese on a Snowy Night or How's the Second Week of Advent Goin' for Ya?

The story goes that tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches....  Actually, I don't know that story.  If you do, tell me.  I just can't remember when I didn't eat that comforting, homey classic Saturday noon meal.   My kids grew up eating it, but mama's got a brand new bag.

This time around, I made the tomato soup myself.  No sugar, sweetheart.  Just a drop of honey to counteract the acid in the tomatoes.  And...no grilled cheese sandwich.  Not for me.  Dave had one.  Instead, I fried my cheese and gently topped my soup with it.

It was creamy, crunchy and fulfilled all those grilled cheesey longings while I skipped the bread on a cold, cold night with the snow flying across the piano window:

 

Curried Pumpkin Soup or Julie Used to Live Here

I adore pumpkin in nearly any form.  I think I love pumpkins because they appear during my birthday month.  Maybe not, though.  Because, truly:  I love to eat them.  Almost any way.  While I'm sure pumpkin soup has been around a long time (A quick peek at my historical cookbooks, however makes no mention of it.  American Cookery 1796 has a recipe for Pumpkin Pudding.  Fanny Farmer, 1896, lists only pumpkin pie.  The  Household Searchlight Recipe Book, 1931, has listings for canning pumpkin, making pumpkin custard, jam, and pie with cheese crust--but no soup,) I had never tasted it until 1985 when we went to live in Spokane, Washington, and my God's gift of a neighbor, Joyce Smith, made pumpkin soup in the pumpkins for a holiday meal.  Ten years later, I traveled right here to St. Paul, and good cook Lani Jordan whipped up a pumpkin-peanut butter soup for Sue's birthday lunch.  

My own soup was years later coming.  Late 90's maybe.  By now, it comes in several guises.  I sometimes blend cooked, ripe pears and apples into the mix.. or other batches contain a touch of vanilla and a sprinkle of pumpkin seeds on top.  One memorable pot was ladled into bowls with my sweet-crunch  "Go Nuts" as garnish.  I've also been known to use a mix of squashes and vegetables (also cooked dried beans) with the soup and up the heat factor, as well.

While, according to an old Craig Claiborne book, you can steam unpeeled pieces of pumpkin and later peel and mash them, I'm by now definitely attached to opening a can.  As are many women.  And...
Pumpkin anything is pretty simple if you're willing to used canned pumpkin.  I also adore butternut squash soup, but if you want to make butternut squash anything,  you have to peel and cook the rock-hard thing.  Which takes a lot of effort.  I buy a new peeler every year because the winter squash wreaks havoc with them.  Even Paula Deen gets one of her boys to peel her squash.   (My children don't seem to be waiting in the wings to peel my squash.  Where are you?)   Your other option is to pay through the nose for already cut-up butternut squash.  I'm not doing that.   But pumpkin!  Well, that's why God made Libby's, right?  (Or go ahead and roast or microwave a whole one if you have to, but after trying it once,  you'll head to the grocery store canned aisle.)  I seem to be on a pumpkin jag lately--both in this blog and in Dinner Place.    So!  Go ahead and make pumpkin soup.  Did I say it's quick?

Tuscan Bean Soup or It Might as Well be Spring

One-pot, no soak Tuscan Bean Soup with Rosemary and Chicken

Hot, cold.  Hot, cold.  The weather here is like a menopausal woman.  To be fair, it hasn't been hot.  Except in my house where there's a radiator stuck on high.  According to local legend, it can't be fixed until summer.   Who said?  So when I clean the bathroom upstairs, I turn into a sauna.   That's right, I used the correct pronoun.

Outdoors yesterday, the temperature hit about 41 degrees Fahrenheit.   The Macalester College running club (We live about 4 blocks from "Mac.")  ran by in T-tiny shorts singing,

"We're  having a heat wave, a tropical heat wave.  The temperature's rising; it isn't surprising..."

 While I'm the first girl to put on her tee shirt and grill (actually I don't grill outdoors and don't care to learn--that's what Dave is for), I'll always have to admit I adore indoor and cozy cooking.  I like it cold enough to leave the oven on for hours happily braising while I read. ("I'm cooking today.")  Or for a soup to giggle and pop all afternoon on the stove.  I'm the woman Hillary Clinton didn't want to be...I did stay home and bake cookies. Among other things.  So I'm the only person in the Twin Cities who is glad it's still kinda cold.  (It's 67 in Colorado Springs; I've been watching.)  Everyone else is giving their flip flops a test run in the lingering snow while I am snug in my Clarks' boots.  I'll give you this:  my blood is still thickening after 15 years in Colorado where the beautiful weather is a well-kept secret.

What's the pits is that the dogs are so funky dirty stinky from the melting snow-mud that I'd like to drop them off at the groomers and let them live there for the next month.  We've got a dog shower in the basement (no joke) that I guess I'll break down and use, though they'll just be filthy again in ten and my back will hurt.

Dad's in a big meeting on the phone; we have to stay out. Whah.

 All that said (are you tired of that phrase?) I'm still in the mood for homey, warming soups and stews.  Not only because the weather calls for them, but also because they feed us well, healthily and economically.  Who doesn't like to cook once and eat thrice?  Or eat once, freeze and eat once a week for the next two?  Or share like we'll do tonight with a friend.  I'll take some bread to a neighbor who adores bread, too.

Here's the No-Knead Bread I made for the soup.

What's food for if it isn't shared?  Speaking of which, the book TAKE THIS BREAD, by Sara Miles is life-changing (as I mentioned at the end of the last post).  A "radical" conversation about communion, the book is also a lot about food, feeding people, and what that all means to you and me.  In my world (in my heart), we are called to feed one another in many ways...but I believe firmly that we are called to share, eat and love one another because of it.  While there are no atheists in fox holes, there might also be no enemies around a dinner table.  What?  We could toast,

Here's to you.  I hate you.

I don't think so.  Touching bread together is a means of healing.  In many ways.

Here's to this soup; it's something you could easily share.  Don't be afraid.  People love to be invited.  They don't care if you haven't swept (and if they do, they need to get over THAT), but they care that someone is interested enough in them to want to spend an evening --a morning, an afternoon-- with them.  They care that someone loves enough to cook.  A restaurant meal (much the thing now) isn't the same.  To begin with, the restaurant:

1. is expensive
2. might not be healthy
3. wants you gone
4. wants to have someone else at your table
5. wants to make more money
6. doesn't put your love into the food

All right, I'll give you this:  they might.  Many cooks/chefs really want the best for their customers, but just as many simply want it to be nine o'clock. 

Beans, water,  ham hock and rosemary...it starts like this.

 So call a friend(s), throw the place mats on the table, turn on the music, light the candles, pour the wine, and make this soup.  Not in that order.  Some tiny bit of a crunchy salad and a chewy boule or baguette round out the meal and the bread's great for dunking.  A couple of tiny cookies or a small scoop of gelato would be sweet for an ending.    (Wine? I like a Cotes du Rhone here, but you might prefer a light Italian red like a Moltepulciano.) Here's the story in pictures:

Start with a great ham hock.

Cook the beans with onion, rosemary and the ham hock.  No salt.

Remove the hock, add stock, chicken pieces, and veg.

Throw in a couple of tomatoes with the chicken and vegetables; remove to cool, peel easily, and chop.

Chop the rosemary finely this time; you don't want to eat a Christmas tree.

Carefully chop meat from hock.  Remove fat and tendons; check for bones.

Now that's an easy way to peel a tomato.

The chicken, simmered in liquid, is done quickly.  Remove, cool, skin, bone, and shred.

Put it all back in the pot and let her roll. Turn down and simmer. 

 Cook's Note:  No cooking and letting the beans sit for an hour; no overnight soak. You just start cooking the beans for this soup in one pan and add EVERYTHING else in a row.  Total cooking/prep time is 3 hours, perhaps less.  I gave it an extra 30 minutes simmer to come together at the end.  Of course it's great the next day after all the ingredients swam in the same sea, slept in the same bed, washed in the same water, or whatever metaphor floats your boat.

Tuscan Bean Soup with Rosemary and Chicken makes 5 qts approximately

1/2-3/4# dried cannellini or northern white bean/navy beans
1 ham hock (I used half a large one)
2 large onions, peeled and chopped, divided
4 cloves garlic, chopped, divided
1/2 t freshly ground black pepper
2 sprigs rosemary, divided  (Leave one whole; mince the other.)

3 pieces chicken with bones and skin
1 qt chicken stock, low or no salt
1 c white wine or water
2 firm red tomatoes (or 1 15 oz can chopped tomatoes)
1 c chopped carrots
3 stalks celery with leaves, chopped
(1/4 c chopped cabbage, 1/4 c chopped green beans, optional-I had them and put them in.)
1/4 c chopped parsley
Kosher salt; freshly ground pepper (start with 1 tsp salt and 1/8 t pepper)
Several drops of Tabasco or other hot sauce (or a pinch of crushed red pepper or ground cayenne)

1 c fresh spinach leaves

1/2 c Parmesan
Zest of 1 fresh lemon

1. Bring to a boil beans and 2-3 qts peppered (no salt) water.  Add  ham hock, 1 of the chopped onions, and a whole sprig of rosemary.  (Leave the stem in until soup is done; the leaves will have cooked and become quite tender at the end of 3 hours.) Lower heat, cover partially, and let cook at a low boil for about 1 1/2 hours until beans are becoming tender.  Add some water if beans are not boiling freely.  Remove ham hock, cool, shred (leave out fat and gristle) and return meat to pot.
2. Add chicken stock, wine or water, 3 pieces of chicken, and all of the vegetables/herbs (including the other chopped onion, the other sprig of minced rosemary, and the other 2 chopped garlic cloves) except the spinach.  Stir in salt, pepper and Tabasco.  Return to a boil; lower heat and simmer 2-3 minutes.  Remove tomatoes and let cool a few minutes.  Skin, chop and return tomatoes to pot.
3. Cook soup until chicken is no longer pink in middle and vegetables are tender, 20 minutes or so.  Remove chicken and let cool for five minutes. Skin, bone and chop.  Return meat to the pot; discard bones and skin.  (Unless you have a dog who likes chicken skin.)  Taste and adjust seasonings.
4. Remove 2 cups of the soup and puree in the food processor or mash well with a potato masher.  You could also use an immersion blender very briefly.* Return mashed soup to pot, stir, and bring to a boil.   Cook a couple of minutes and lower heat to a bare simmer.
5. Add spinach; cook 1 minute.  Stir well.  Taste and adjust seasonings.  More salt?  Pepper?  Hot sauce?  Carefully add just a teense of any of these and taste again.   Serve hot  with 1T grated Parmesan and a 1/2 tsp lemon rind to top each large bowl.  A dusting of pepper might be welcome as well.

*You want a soup that shows all of its elements--beans, vegetables and meat--merely thickened by the small amount of pureed soup.  You don't want a totally pureed soup.

Chicken and Noodles FAST! or I Finally Got my Snow Day

How quickly can you say Chicken and Noodles?

A not-so-freaky Spring storm hit St. Paul Wednesday, snarling traffic and causing 250 accidents in the metro area.  Which makes me wonder why we all think we  MUST get to work no matter the weather.  Even when the chances of our becoming harmed in the process rise dramatically.   I wonder how much difference it made once folks braved the weather, the roads, and the other drivers.  Especially as the other drivers included guys like one whose semi jack-knived on the interstate and stopped traffic for a good long while in the ice and snow.   At the end of the day, a friend stopped by to drop off a bedside table, mirror and lamp.  Luckily I had shoveled (and shoveled.)  She said it took her and hour and a half to get to work and then none of her appointments showed anyway.

Male downy woodpecker eats fast.  The female eats here, too.  Not at the same time.

When we weren't "protected" by steel, glass and plastic (fueled by flammable liquids), did we decide we simply had to venture out in the elements when God had definitely decreed a day indoors by the fire making a pot of soup and reading?  Did our great-grandparents decide to walk to town in the midst of blizzards?  ("I'm sure I can get there; I need to mail that letter today so it gets there by next month.")

Birds were smart.  They went from the tree to the feeder and back.  Period.

I can't see it.  Life's just too precious and yet I'd be called a wimp if I called in snow.  I watched Dave call a cab, drag his suitcase through the mire and head off to the airport.  My darling got on a plane in that mess, albeit hours later.  I guess he enjoyed the time in the Minneapolis airport; at least it's the nicest (in my opinion) one in the country.   The dogs and I stayed snug.

Temp furniture bought for a song.  Ours will arrive in two months after the snow melts.  Argh.

 The south side of my house faces a fairly busy street (the price of being close to shops and restaurants), so I was able to watch the slip and slide show all day long.  These people couldn't see and they were driving.  It got no better as time wore on.  No plow came and the realization that the plow was waiting for the snow to stop (he knew more than I did as I shoved a couple of times) let me know I was staying home.  Good thing, too, because when the plow did arrive, it laid in a pile of icebergs several feet high at the bottom of my driveway.  Someone then parked in front of it, thinking there was a space on the street.  You know how parking in the snow is.  I could walk out if I felt like it, which I didn't, but my car was going nowhere.  Lenten study at church would have to wait 'til next week.

To shorten the story, it took  more than 24 hours and a young man with two shovels and an ice pick an hour and a half of work (after I shoveled three hours/can you say sore?) to free up access to the street.  Lesson learned:  don't park your car in your drive or garage before a snow storm.  You won't be able to GET OUT afterward. 

Luckily, I had something hot to keep me company.  I had to cook it, though.

Cook's Note:  This is not a long afternoon's chicken noodle soup; it cooks in about 30 minutes.  Still, it's lovely, warming and you didn't have to spend the afternoon in from the snow to get it done.

Easy and Fast Chicken and Noodles serves 2-3; easily doubles

1T each olive oil and butter

3 pieces of chicken (1 breast, 1 leg and 1 thigh)

Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper

2 stalks celery,  chopped

1 medium onion, chopped

1 clove garlic, minced (optional)

2 large carrots, peeled and cut up

1/3 c fresh parsley, chopped

1/2 tsp each thyme and rosemary (you could sub sage or poultry seasoning)

3 cups chicken stock or water

6 oz frozen egg noodles

1/2 c frozen peas 

1. In a 3-4 qt heavy saucepan or small stockpot, heat oil and butter over medium-high heat and add chicken that you've salted and peppered well.  Add vegetables, herbs, and spices.  Let brown well 5-7 minutes; turn, stir, and let brown another 5 minutes.
2. Add stock.  Bring to a boil.  Reduce heat and simmer, covered, over low heat about 30 minutes.
3. Meantime, follow package directions and cook 6 oz frozen egg noodles in a separate pot for 20 minutes, adding frozen peas last 3 minutes.
4. Strain noodles and peas; add to chicken mixture.  Taste and adjust seasonings.  Serve hot.  For a more chicken and dumplings feel, add 1/2 cup milk to the pot when you add the noodles and peas. 

I'm reading...  Books on Minnesota (duh), The Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus's Final Days in Jerusalem by Marcus J. Borg and John Dominic Crossan, Take This Bread: A Radical Conversion by Sara Miles, Goat Song: A Seasonal Life, A Short History of Herding, and the Art of Making Cheese by Brad Kessler.  I just bought Home Cheese Making: Recipes for 75 Delicious Cheeses by Rikki Carroll and The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon but I haven't started them.  I've promised my Colorado Springs book club I'd read THE CURIOUS INCIDENT...by next Wed.   Time to get going.  By the way, Sara Miles book is life-changing and GOAT SONG is one of the most lovingly-written books of the decade.  Where did he learn to write like that?

On Minnesota Public Radio this morning:  We would need $21 million to feed the hungry in Minnesota; that would be for 8 billion meals. 

Sing a new song,
Alyce

Curried Cauliflower Soup or The Rite of Spring on Bach's Birthday

Hot lunch on a cold spring day

 Outside the window in the new/old (1915) St. Paul house, it's fairly gray.  Everything's gray, in fact.  Melting snow, sky, sun, trees...even the birds appear kind of gray.  But spring it is!

Jack Sparrow and Friend

When you've moved, the chores are myriad.  It seems you're always running to the hardware store for a light switch cover or to Target for garbage bags and peanut butter.  If you're not running, you're on the phone with the phone company or recycling folks.  If you're not on the phone, you're looking at paint samples or asking where the post office is.  (What happened to phone books?)

Sooner or later, plates seem to be on shelves and towels are clean and folded in the bathroom.  You know where to turn the light on for the basement and have figured out what that horrible sound is between the floors or in the walls. (Hot water pipes.)  You have the turn to your house memorized and don't have to count houses from the corner anymore.  And one day, you start making meals again--hardly noticing the skipped nights or that you're in a different kitchen.  Well, I wouldn't go that far.  I am definitely in a different kitchen, though I'm feeling the similarities as I get things squared away.

I had things to do this morning like

• clean the back porch
• scrub the basement stairs (honest-to-God linoleum)
• wash rugs and bathmats
• bleach down the bathrooms, one of which has an old-fashioned claw-foot tub

 Cool thing was, these are typical house chores--not moving chores.  We've been here long enough for the bathrooms to need a scrub.

So when I got done with the morning work-out, I wanted real food for lunch.  I was sure my hard-working husband wanted some, too.  Scouting out the frig and pantry (still not full, of course), a big cauliflower reared up its head called me by name.  A quick look around the counter and I located onions, shallots, garlic, apples and one lone pretty ripe pear.  I thought I'd throw most of it in the oven to roast while I did one last chore and then puree it all with some chicken stock and curry powder.  Here it is just for you.

As Dave and I sat down to eat, Stravinsky's "Rite of Spring" (1913) came on the local NPR and the day just came together.  A spring-like light, but warming soup with a kick.  I just couldn't figure out how Bach's birthday figured in, but it's today, too.  Happy Birthday, Johann.  And thanks for Bach, God.

Curried Roasted-Cauliflower Soup
1 head cauliflower, cut into florets
1 apple, peeled and cut up into eighths
1 large onion, same drill
4t olive oil, divided
Sprinkle of kosher salt and freshly ground pepper

1 shallot, cut in large pieces
1 garlic clove, same drill
1 small carrot, minced
1 stalk of celery, minced
1 ripe pear, peeled and cut up
1 t curry powder, divided
Pinch each cinnamon and crushed red pepper

1 qt chicken or vegetable stock
1/2 c each white wine and water (or 1 c water)
1/3 c parsley, chopped
1/8 t cinnamon
1/4 t kosher salt
1/8 t white pepper, ground


  Preheat oven to 350 F. On a large baking sheet, place cauliflower, onion and apple.  Drizzle with  2t oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper.  Place sheet in oven and roast for about 30 minutes.

 Meantime, in a small soup kettle (4qt),  saute shallot, garlic, carrot and celery in the other 2t olive oil about 5 minutes over low heat, taking care to not burn the shallot and garlic.  Add pear,  1/2 t of the curry powder, parsley, cinnamon and crushed red pepper.  Stir and saute another minute or so.  Add stock, wine and/or water, cinnamon, salt and pepper and stir.  Bring to a boil and lower heat to a bare simmer.

When cauliflower, apple and onion are roasted, add them to the stockpot and stir.  Bring soup up to a boil and lower heat to a slow boil.  Add rest of curry powder.   Let cook 5-10 minutes.  Puree with immersion blender or in batches in the food processor (carefully).  Taste, adjust seasonings and serve hot with a piece of buttered whole wheat toast.

 Easier yet:  Roast everything, add to stock and puree.  Leaving out fruit, celery, carrot, etc. will produce a more pronounced cauliflower-tasting soup, but also makes things simpler.

Now I'm off to Ace to buy a mesh strainer for the end of the washing machine hose.  Oh well.

Sing a new song or warm up your fingers and give Bach a whirl,
Alyce

Root Vegetable Barley Beef Soup or Where's the weather, Craig?

Solution for a cold winter's day

 You know how you feel you know your weatherman?  Dave and I refer to the ones we like (Mike and Craig on channel 5 in Colorado Springs -NBC affiliate and Al Roker on TODAY) by their first names, though they wouldn't know us from Adam.

"What's Craig say today?"
or
"Did Mike say what the temperature would be tonight?  Should I bring the herbs in?" (cover the annuals, shut off the sprinklers, bring in the car.... oh the things governed by Mike.)

"Why is Al in another studio?"  "And what's he wearing?" "How'd he lose all that weight?"  Answer is always, "I dunno."

Today these intimate friends have forecast all day long for horrible weather...across the country, including Colorado Springs.  I canceled a trip to go oversee an inspection on our new house (actually quite old-built in 1915) in St. Paul:

 So the snow would come and go and disappear.  But the sky stayed gray.  Which it doesn't in Colorado Springs.  Except once a year or so.  But bad weather?  Not happening.  Not here.  Not yet.  No how.  Maybe later or tomorrow. 

Who knew, though?  Bad weather?  I make soup.  I make bread.  And I did.

The soup is hearty enough for a Super Bowl stew; it's a beef vegetable soup with nearly only root vegetables and  some barley.  Maybe it could be made from your pantry; I did it from mine.

The bread is a recipe from one of my favorite food writers,Mark Bittman- New York Times.  It's the quick version of the famous 2006 No-Knead Bread.  If you haven't yet made that bread, here's the link to the original article about Jim Lahey (Sullivan Street Bakery) and the bread.  It's world famous, by now.   Well, nearly.  Definitely the most famous recipe in the New York Times, at least for Bittman, in ten years.  That's what he said in his last (boohoo) column.  That's saying something.  ( I have made the "regular" no-knead bread, as well, and will include a pic of that below.)   And, yes, the longer version is definitely better, but the the quick one's good and it's short!  We don't always have 20 hours.  Here's how:

Root Vegetable Barley Beef Soup for a Bad Weather Day (right)

• 3T canola oil
• 5 # beef chuck roast, trimmed and cut into 1" cubes
• 3 large onions, chopped, divided
• 1 bunch celery, including leaves, chopped coarsely; divided
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 6 carrots, cut into 1" pieces; divided
• 3-4 parsnips, peeled and cored (if large) and cut into 1/4"-1/2" pieces; divided
• 1 large turnip, peeled and cut into 1/4"- 1/2" piece; divided
• 2 qts water
• 1 bay leaf
• 1/2 tsp freshly ground pepper
• 1 c fresh parsley, chopped finely; divided
• 2 qts beef stock, low sodium (your own fresh or frozen or boxed/jarred from the store)
• 1 28 oz can chopped tomatoes, no salt
• 2 c shredded green cabbage
• 2 t kosher salt
• several drops of Tabasco
• 2/3 c medium pearled barley
• 1T basil or 1 t dry thyme, optional

1. In a very large stockpot, heat oil over medium heat and add half the beef.  Let brown well and turn.  Let that side brown and remove meat to a plate.  Add rest of beef to the pot and repeat.  Add in onion, the garlic, and 1/3 of the celery, carrots, parsnips and turnips.  When meat is well-browned, add the already-cooked beef and stir well together.
2. Pour in the water and add the bay leaf, pepper and half of the parsley.  Stir well and bring to a boil.  Cover and reduce  heat.  Simmer until beef and vegetables are tender, 1 1/2- 2 hours.
3.   Bring back to a boil and add the rest of the vegetables (including the cabbage), parsley, stock, tomatoes, salt, Tabasco, barley and basil or thyme, if using.  Cook until barley is tender, 40-50 minutes.
4. Taste and adjust seasonings.
5.  Serve hot in large, warmed bowls with hefty hunks of baguette and butter if you didn't make the bread.

Cook's Note:  This is a one-afternoon soup in Alyce's tradition of making the stock and the soup nearly all together.  While it's not a perfect solution, it's tasty and workable.  You cook the meat with a few vegetables and make a stock, adding the rest at the end and including some store-bought stock to round out the soup.  It's definitely not original, but I worked it out myself raising a houseful of kids who needed meals every night for about twenty years.  Before adding the second round of vegetables and jarred/boxed stock, you can also remove the already cooked vegetables and puree them, if you like.  Of course, you throw them right back in the pot.  It gives you the opportunity for having only freshly-cooked veg in the final soup if that's important to you.

Cook's Note for the Bread: Read the recipe and instructions thoroughly before beginning.

A little gallery for you:

House so cold, I had to leave bread in the oven and take a temp; it needs to rise at 70 F.

Here's the bread trail... If you print the recipe from the link, you'll understand.

Simple, great crumb, lovely crust.. yummy.

Heat bowl 30 min 450F first

Smelling and tapping... Anyone remember James Beard's bread book?


Note:  Above bread is the quick version of the No-Knead Bread.
Below is the regular version, which is NOT so quick, but still simple.  (Click on link.)

Two-Dog Kitchen and Around the 'Hood

Cooked up the beef trimmings for the pups...

80th Birthday for Grandpa Gene--Quite a party!

Prayers for peace in Egypt....particularly for the food supply.

Thinking of friend K. preparing a difficult Bartok piece for double piano; the concert's this week. 

Safe travel for my niece.

Thanks to folks in St. Paul putting our house through inspection.

Blessings on First Presbyterian of Champaign, Illinois, where we worshiped Sunday with family.

Warmth and safety to all those facing the weather in our country.

A great semester to daughter Emily and all her fellow-seminarians beginning the second semester of the school year.

Went to see "True Grit" with Dave, Bill, Lorna and Gene.  Come back, John Wayne?

 

Sing a new song, 

Alyce