Soup + spuds

My mom makes the best soups!! 

I mean, they are really delicious! Unfortunately, I live pretty far away from her, so I don't often get to enjoy her soups these days.

So the other day, when I had a craving for one of her soups, I decided to make it myself. 

After a quick call to my mom, she shared her recipe for Cream of Potato Soup!

I really like this soup, and since I had plenty of room in my freezer I decided to double the recipe. (However, a single batch of the recipe still makes over 10 cups of soup!)

First, I peeled a ton of potatoes. Whenever I do this, I always think of those WWII movies where people pull "KP Duty" and sit for hours peeling buckets full o' spuds!

Then I poured the chicken broth into my soup pot (our preferred brand of broth for this soup is Swanson).

Once the potatoes were peeled, I chopped them into similar sized pieces and added them to the broth.

While the potatoes simmered, I sauteed some chopped onions in butter.

While the potatoes cooked, I organized the rest of the ingredients.

Most importantly was the milk. In order to thicken the soup, we mix flour into the milk.

It is important that the milk mixture be smooth, so instead of just dumping the flour into the milk, we mix a bit of the milk with the flour until it it smooth, and then we whisk that mixture into the milk. Are you still with me?

Once the potatoes were tender, I added the onions which had been sauteed in butter, along with the milk that had flour mixed in.

As the soup cooked more, I made sure to stir it frequently so it didn't burn.

Of course what is potato soup with a bit of salt and pepper?

So I ground a couple teaspoons of black pepper...

And added it to the soup. (This step is pretty important, as you'll see from my mom's recipe below!)

Believe it or not, that's all it took to make my mom's tasty Cream of Potato Soup!

If you'd like to try this recipe yourself, here it is:

Cream of Potato Soup
Recipe courtesy of my mom!!

Ingredients*:
3 ½ C Potatoes (or more)- cut into cubes
8 C Chicken Broth (Swanson)
½ C diced Onion
1 stick of butter
2 C milk
5 T flour
1 teaspoon black pepper
Salt to taste


Directions:
Peel and cut potatoes into small cubes and simmer in chicken broth until tender. Sauté onions in butter until translucent. Mix together milk and flour until there are no lumps. When potatoes are tender, add sautéed onions and butter and stir in milk and flour mixture. Soup will thicken. Add pepper starting with ½ tsp. and adding more to taste. (The pepper makes a huge difference, so don’t be a sissy!). Add salt to taste.

 *Note: I doubled this recipe in the blog post above!

Thanks for stopping by- and special thanks to my mom for the recipe! I hope you have a great day!!

Carrot Curry Soup

Even though it's the middle of winter, nothing warms my soul (and my tummy) like a bowl of homemade soup!
So I made Carrot Curry Soup over the weekend!
The soup required surprisingly few ingredients: just carrots, a bit of butter, an onion, chicken broth, and lemon juice!
I started by chopping the onion.
I then melted the butter in my dutch oven, before adding curry powder.
When the pan was hot, I added the onion (along with salt and pepper) and sauteed it for a few minutes.
Once the onion was soft I added the chicken stock and water...
Before dumping in the carrots!
Once the soup had reached a rolling boil, I turned the dial down to "simmer" and placed the lid on the pot for 20 minutes.
Once everything was tender...
I whipped out my immersion blender and got to work!
Once the soup was smooth, I added some lemon juice and considered my work done!
I couldn't wait to dig into this easy (and pretty healthy) soup! It turned out to be very flavorful, which is sometimes hard to come by this time of year!

Carrot Curry Soup

Ingredients
2 tablespoons butter
1 cup chopped onion
1 teaspoon curry powder
Coarse salt and ground pepper
3 1/2 cups chicken broth
2 pounds carrots, peeled and cut into 1-inch chunks
1 to 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
Coarsely chopped fresh parsley, for garnish (optional)

Directions
Heat butter in a Dutch oven or large saucepan over medium heat. Add onion, curry powder, salt, and pepper. Cook, stirring occasionally, until onion is soft, about 5 minutes. Add broth, carrots, and 3 cups water; bring to a boil. Reduce heat; cover, and simmer until carrots are tender, about 20 minutes. Puree soup (either with an immersion blender or in batches in a food processor) until smooth. Stir in lemon juice. Serve garnished with parsley, if desired.

I hope you had a wonderful weekend- thanks for stopping by!

Squashy-appley bliss!

If you're a regular around this blog, you know all about my love for soup! So it should come as no surprise that as the weather on the East Coast cools down, I crave every manner of soup I can think of. So the other day when I was at the grocery store and noticed that butternut squash was on sale, the only thing I could think of was soup! When I came home (carrying over 10 pounds of squash because I couldn't stop at just one), I found a recipe online and after a few alterations I had created a soup I was pleased with: Squash and Apple Soup!
The ingredients were wonderfully basic:
I started by peeling and chopping a squash (around 4.5 pounds)...
An apple (I went with the a local Gala)...
And an onion.
After heating some butter in my dutch oven...
I added the onion slices along with some ground nutmeg.
After the onions were translucent, I added the squash...
And apple chunks.
I then poured in some apple juice (I would have loved to use cider, but there wasn't any at the store quite yet)...
And chicken stock.
Once I'd given the ingredients a good stir, I put the lid on and did some chores while the pot simmered away.
After a good while, I came back tp check the pot and met with a full face of steam!
After a moment my camera defogged and I could see that the squash was completely cooked.
I got out my trusty immersion blender (Dad- did you have any idea when you gave that to me years ago that I would use it so often?) and got to work.
Once I had the consistency to my liking I added a bit of salt and pepper...
Until everything was just perfect! I like my soups on the thick side, so I was thrilled with the outcome- but an extra cup of broth would thin this out quite nicely!
If you'd like to whip up a pot of this yummy soup, here's the recipe:

Squash and Apple Soup

Ingredients:
2 Tbsp butter
1 whole onion, chopped
½ teaspoons ground nutmeg
4 ¼ pounds Butternut Squash, peeled, seeded and cut into cubes
3 cups chicken broth
1 whole Gala apple, peeled, cored and chopped
½ cups apple juice

Directions: Melt butter in a large pot. Add onion and nutmeg; saute until onion begins to brown, about 5 minutes. Add the butternut squash, chicken broth, diced apple and apple juice. Bring to a boil; reduce heat and simmer uncovered until squash and apple are tender, about 30 minutes. Using an immersion blender, puree soup to your liking. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Bring soup to simmer, thinning with more broth if needed.

Oh- and I have to mention that this recipe results in a good amount of soup!
Thanks for stopping by- I hope you have a great weekend!