Archive for January, 2008
Week of Soup: Sassy Salsa
In my quest to find some distinctive soup recipes for SFTF’s Week of Soup, I flipped through just about all my cookbooks. I got a good workout lifting them up and down from the high shelf in my kitchen that they call home. I have big books, little books, soft cover books, hard backed books, spiral bound and saddle-stitched, all-text types, pictures- on-every-page types, black and white graphics, vivid color graphics, thick books and thin books… In short, while I might not have every cookbook in the world (an achievement I have to admit contemplating tackling on occasion), I do have quite the variety of them.
As I’ve talked about before though, A Good Day for Soup seems to stand above the others, at least when I’m looking for portage inspiration of course. To look at it, you might not be quick to pick this book up at the store. It’s paperback and not terribly pretty. By that I mean, the cover is nice and graphic but not scrumptious as so many cookbooks’ are. The recipes are copious but there’s nary a picture to be seen, something that’s almost guaranteed to have me putting a cookbook back on the store’s shelf instead of the cashier’s counter. But, for whatever reason, I did buy this picture-less book, and I’ve always been glad I did. The recipes are written with such passion and interest that I just know, deep down in my soup-making bones, the authors are kindred spirits of mine.
Having thumbed through its pages many a time before, I was surprised to see a recipe I hadn’t noticed before this time – a chilled soup made from tomatillos. This recipe was perfect…if it were August! But in January I’d be hard pressed to 1) find local tomatillos and 2) work up the will to eat cold soup. Rarely daunted by such problematic points, I thought to myself that I might have luck adapting this recipe to use up some of my frozen stores of salsa verde…hmmmm… You see, the farm had absolute GOBS of tomatillos this summer, and I had no choice but to make GOBS of salsa verde to freeze. I have since regretted this non-choice on the occasions when my big toe has gotten an unhappy reception when I open the freezer door and a container falls out. Too much frozen salsa verde can indeed be a bad thing.
So really, I had nothing to loose. As for the temperature thing, I figured if a soup can be cooked, why can’t it be eaten warm? Indeed! For the sake of experiment, I tried it both ways, and I really did prefer it warm. In fact, I was pleased as punch with its flavor overall. If you don’t have your own frozen stash of salsa verde on hand at the moment, this soup is still feasible using a jar of salsa verde from the grocery store. Just give the stuff you buy a taste prior to putting it in the soup. If it’s got a lot of hot pepper heat to it already, cut back on the minced jalapeno called for in the salsa topping. I had made my frozen salsa verde relatively mild so that it might prove more adaptable for just such occasions as this when I’m trying out a new recipe.
Week of Soup: Peanuts with a Bite
I realize I wasn’t much of a lean mean posting machine last week. I have a very good excuse for the lag. I was busy preparing for this week. See, this week is one I’ve been anticipating/planning for almost a month and required a little advanced cooking. Now it’s finally time to kick off SFTF’s Week of Soup! And, boy, do I ever have some wing-dinger recipes for you!
My mom got me started (of course) on homemade soup when we used to can our own vegetable soup mix during the summer that then sustained us through the winter. She didn’t have any hard-and-fast recipe. Instead, whatever the garden was producing the most of that year is what inevitably led the chorus of flavors in the soup mix. Surprisingly enough though, my mom rarely made other soups once she had a full larder of the vegetable mix and her other stand-by, chicken corn/noodle. I didn’t care. I never got tired of that vegetable soup!
Once I left home for college and started working in the Allentown Fairgrounds Farmers Market, I took advantage of the “one hour until closing time so everything must go!” frenzy by collecting ever-changing assortments of fresh vegetables and fruits to take back to my roommates and our tiny kitchen. Since many of these vegetables where not the pick of the litter, having sat in the market stalls for three days, I often found myself with a sack of veggies that were in a “do or die” state. I had to do something with them right then and there or toss them in the trash. Since a poor college student never throws food in the trash, I got creative. Soup, my friends, was the answer almost every single time (except for the occasional salsa).
Thus ends the tale of how soup became my “thing”. I quickly learned that just about anything can go into soup once you get the basic concept down. In fact, after I’ve shown you a few tried-and-true recipes, I’m going to take you step-by-step through a challenge I’m issuing to myself. Without going shopping and with no recipe to follow, I plan on making soup at the end of this week with whatever’s left in my kitchen prior to my weekly Friday night grocery run. Should be interesting, right?
For now, I wanted to kick things off with my favorite soup of all time, Georgia Peanut Soup. Coincidentally, I ran into this soup for the first time also during college. There was a great vegetarian café, the Green Café, across the river in Bethlehem that stood in as my dinner spot when I went to listen to the bands at the Fun House. Their peanut soup was amazing. I dutifully asked for the recipe but was told it wasn’t really up for grabs since the cook just made it as she went along. Well, that was cool and all, but didn’t really help me out.
Honestly, I forgot about the peanut soup once I graduated and moved to Philly. That is, until I bought my copy of The Cook’s Encyclopedia of Soups and saw what could only be a great starting recipe for my beloved peanut soup. After dabbling with it over the years, I think it’s just about a perfect replica of the Green Café’s version. It packs quite the punch of spicy heat with the rich creamy peanut flavor acting as a nice counterbalance. And of course all that peanut butter makes the soup stick to your ribs.
As with almost all soups, the vegetables in this recipe can be traded out for something similar that you might have on hand. Turnips could work in place of the potatoes, and peas could easily stand in for the corn. Just be sure to use the chunkiest peanut butter you can find and add the chopped roasted peanuts to garnish; there’s just something special about getting those nutty crunchy bites!
Show Some Love
I’m not one for self-promotion, unless I’m in a cut-throat interview or jokingly discussing what I’d put in an online dating profile. But I’ve been prompted by outside influences to bite the bullet and ask for some love from my audience of cooking compatriots.
There are currently two blog award contests running, one about to end in 24 hours, and one that’s been quietly ongoing and will continue for several months.
The 2008 Weblog Awards, or “Bloggies” as they’re affectionately called, are currently open for votes, but only until 10 p.m. tomorrow (Friday). It’s a little involved, but I’d be ever so grateful if you’d follow this link to fill in at least two categories for me: “best new weblog” and “best kept-secret weblog.” What, you ask?! No vote for best food blog?! I know I’m not ready to take on the big dogs (just yet). But while you’re there, consider voting for Smitten Kitchen, the Traveler’s Lunchbox, and Simply Recipes, three of my personal favorites. I have no problem promoting others, you see! Oh, one little rule to be aware of: you have to fill in three nominees for the category before you can submit your form. This doesn’t mean you have to fill in all the categories. Just be sure to have two others in mind when you cast your vote for me. You will vote, won’t you?
The second contest, the 2008 Blogger’s Choice Awards, has been chugging along since the 2007 contest was finalized. Unlike the Bloggies, you can vote with just a click (and a quick registration process to ensure no one’s stuffing the ballot box). Just scroll down to the bottom of this page until you see the button on the right hand side. Click and follow the prompts as they come.
Merci! Merci!
Satisfying a Craving
The coo-coo weather we’ve been having here in Philadelphia this week – temperatures in the 60s where the “norm” used to be the 40s – actually succeeded in tricking my brain into thinking it was early autumn again. Last night I had such a craving for sweet corn, I was >this close< to going to the supermarket to see if they had any from California. You see, early autumn yields the sweetest of sweet corn, with small ears that actually aren’t that juicy since the corn’s sugars get concentrated during the cooler nights. I may be the only person in the world that doesn’t like juice dribbling down my chin when I chomp on an ear of corn, but that’s exactly why I like that last few pickings of corn.
My personal preferences aside, I’d all but hopped in the car when I remembered my stash of dried corn. Silly me, almost forgetting! And I even had a new recipe I wanted to try with it that I’d picked up in the tiny bulk foods store near my parents. Half the fun of making a trip home is going to the Walnut Cheese Nook with its rows and rows of spices, flours, grains, sugars, and pastas. And, yes, they ever have dried corn on occasion. Since some shoppers might be hard pressed to know what to do with, say, a four pound bag of wheat gluten, the store is so kind as to offer a pamphlet of recipes and ideas. It’s proven handy more than once.
On this occasion, I thought I’d up the ante a bit by reaching even deeper into my dried preserves larder to use a few oven-dried sweet peppers. I hadn’t done anything other than pop a few in my mouth while I was bagging them up way back in October. My curiosity was getting the best of me, and they seemed like a perfect addition to a savory dish of baked corn.
The dish was delish. So much so I think I might take another batch of it to tomorrow night’s Philly Food Blogger’s Meet-Up potluck. What struck me about this Baked Dried Corn Casserole with Dried Peppers, in comparison to the previous one I had made with dried corn for Christmas dinner, was how soft the kernels were. If I hadn’t made it myself, I would have sworn this dish was made with fresh sweet corn. Only the flavor belied the state of the corn and peppers when they went in the pot – it was a much richer, deeper, sweeter taste.
I am sad though. I only have enough dried corn left for two more dishes. I’ve made a mental note to start tackling the corn drying early next summer so I can have a much larger bin of it. With global warming, there’s surely many more winter days to come with the temperatures of early autumn. No doubt my hankering for sweet corn will likewise rise to the occasion.
Try It. You’ll Like It.
I’ve confessed to my disinterest in cooked turnips before. Is it coincidence that I’m once again lacking inspiration as I try to write this post for a turnip recipe? Something about this bulbous root vegetable just fails to wind my clock, toot my whistle, or even tickle my fancy.
Still, I decided to give cooked turnips another try since I had found some gorgeous Purple Top White Globe turnips (and Honeycrisp apples too) at a farm stand the day after Christmas that I just couldn’t say “no” to on account of their perfect lavender-blushed spheres. These Purple Tops dwarfed the baby Hakureis I still had from Weavers Way Farm’s last turnip harvest in late autumn. I wasn’t sure that it was a wise idea to cook them together, given the young ones might cook much faster. I’m decidedly undecided by times so I used both in the recipe. In the end, slicing them thin negated any concern about different cooking times.
Wondering why I undertook a new recipe for something I was fairly certain I wouldn’t like? The recipe’s creator, Chef Anne Quatrano, is the owner of three restaurants in Atlanta that all abide by one creed: simplicity with subtle complexities. I like that. She and her main squeeze also work her family farm to raise provisions for the restaurants. Now this is a woman after my own heart! I figured I could trust her.
For this particular recipe, she boasts that people who tell her wait staff that they’d like to substitute fries for this side dish because they don’t like turnips always end up eating the complimentary dish she sends out anyway. Apparently no one can resist the charm of Caramelized Apples and Turnips. Seeing as how I don’t like not liking any vegetable, I was ready to be converted, and this seemed to be my best shot at salvation.
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