french onion soup

Everyone should have a good french onion soup in their cooking arsenal right? It's easy to make ahead, and if you have people over for dinner, you can serve them in crocks and broil the cheese topping in just a couple minutes. But that's where the practicality can end if you want - it's one of the best vehicles for maximum melted cheese consumption. And can anyone guess where I scored my recipe? Soup? Hello? Of course, like every good soup around AHB, it's New England Soup Factory. (I have absolutely no association with the restaurant or book, in case you're starting to get suspicious.)

Grocery list: hunks of french bread for the topping (the original gives a nice twist on "garlicky croutons, but I skipped that in lieu of my own fresh wheat bread), 6T butter, 8 large vidalia onions (peeled and sliced), 3 cloves garlic (peeled and sliced), 2 cups cream sherry, 3 T tomato paste, 4 quarts beef stock, 2 bay leaves, 1 T cornstarch dissolved in 3 T water, 1 T balsamic vinegar, 1.5-2 cups grated gruyere cheese.



Start by slicing all those onions.



Melt the butter in a large stockpot over medium heat. Saute the onions, stirring occasionally, until they've caramelized - about 20 minutes. Add the chopped garlic and cook 20 more minutes. Add 1 cup of the sherry to de-glaze pan.



Next, stir in the rest of the sherry, the tomato paste, beef stock and bay leaves. Increase heat to medium-high and bring to boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 1 hour.



Add the cornstarch-water mixture, bring to a boil and cook for 1 minute. Turn off the heat, stir in the vinegar, then season with salt and pepper. Fish the bay leaves out and throw them away before serving.



When you're read to serve the soup, preheat the broiler, then ladle soup into individual crocks or bowls (make sure they are safe for the oven/broiler).



Place slices of bread on top. Sprinkle (scoop, bulldoze, etc) cheese over bread, and broil until bubbly and brown.



This is as good as any french onion soup I've ever had, I promise. And if you've made a big batch of beef stock lately, I can't imagine a better way to use it.

beef and barley soup

As promised last week, I'm going to share a couple of our favorite soups that you can make with homemade beef stock. And like any of the good soups I've made recently, this one is adapted from a recipe in the oh-so-amazing New England Soup Factory cookbook.

As a side note, I had no idea barley was so healthy. This soup is actually really well balanced, with a lot of fiber and even more protein. If you substitute a leaner cut of meat for the generic "stew beef" called for in the recipe, you further reduce the fat content (not to mention the meat isn't too chewy or sinewy that way).

Grocery list: 3 pounds stew beef (cut into bite size pieces), red wine vinegar, olive oil, 3 minced garlic cloves, 1 large onion (peeled and diced), 2 ribs diced celery, 6 carrots peeled and diced, 1/2 pound pearl barley, 1 cup burgundy wine, 1 8-oz can tomato paste, 8 cups beef stock, 2 bay leaves, 5 dashes worcestershire, 1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley.



To start, cook the meat. Cut the meat into whatever you consider to be "bite size", and place in a stock pot with 1/2 cup red wine vinegar and 12 cups water, plus a generous pinch of salt. Bring it to a boil, then reduce the heat to medium and simmer for 1.5 hours. Drain and reserve the meat.



Next, chop the carrots, celery and onions, and mince the garlic cloves. Heat a couple of turns of olive oil over medium high heat in the same stock pot you used for the beef.



Saute the onion, celery, carrots and garlic in olive oil for about 7 minutes.



Add the cooked beef, wine, tomato paste, stock and bay leaves. Stir in the barley.



It surprised me how much water such a small amount of barley could absorb. Don't worry if it seems like it's not enough barley; it's not like pasta or orzo, as it will double in volume, at least.



Bring to a boil then reduce heat to simmer for 1 hour 15 minutes (stirring occasionally).



Remove from heat and stir in worcestershire and parsley. Remove bay leaves. Season w/salt and pepper and serve.

homemade beef stock

Cooking my own chicken and beef stock is something I've known for a long time I *should* be doing, but it has taken me a couple of years to actually come around to it. But now that I've made my own, I can never go back (at least, I hope my schedule never requires me to go back). On a weekend day, I'll make at least 6 quarts at once, and freeze them in little one quart containers. They taste infinitely better than the store-bought processes versions, are healthier, and they cost less too. I'll share a couple of recipes for soup that requires beef stock as the base soon, but for now, let's start with the basics. This one is loosely adapted from the New England Soup Factory Cookbook (also known as the only soup cookbook you'll ever need).

Grocery list (for 6 quarts stock): 7-8 pounds beef neck or short rib bones, 2 onions, 8 carrots, 8 ribs celery, 8 garlic cloves, salt, whole peppercorns, beef bouillon, bay leaves, thyme, parsley, one can tomato paste.



Quarter the onions; wash and cut the celery and carrots into thirds. Add the vegetables and the bones to a large roasting pan, and spread the tomato paste all over. Season with salt and pepper. Roast for 40 minutes at 450 degrees, till everything has a nice caramelized crust.



Place the contents of the roasting pan in a huge stock pot (12 quart capacity; if you don't have this, divide it up into 2 larger pots). Smash the garlic cloves and throw them in. Add a handful of peppercorns, a generous pinch or two of salt, 3-4 bay leaves, and fill the pot with water till it's almost full. Also add about 1/4 to 1/2 a bunch of fresh parsley, a few sprigs of thyme, and 4-5 beef bouillon cubes. I actually prefer the "better than bouillon" brand of paste, which has no artificial ingredients or MSG - use 4-5 tsps if you have this.

Bring the pot to a boil, then lower the flame so the stock is just simmering. Allow it to cook for 4 hours, adding more water occasionally as it cooks down. After 4 hours, remove from heat and allow to cool. Remove all the big hunks of bone and vegetable with a large slotted spoon. Set another large pot or bowl in the sink, and place a colander over top of it. Line the colander with cheesecloth, then pour the stock right through the colander into the bowl underneath. Then, you can easily measure out 1 quart quantities to freeze.

**Another tip: set all your one quart containers on the counter without the lids first. Allow the stock to cool more, and the fat will congeal on the surface - you can easily skim it off with a spoon. Once you've sealed the containers, beef stock keeps for 3-4 days in the fridge, or at least a couple of months in the freezer.

butternut squash soup

I hope it doesn't do injustice to this recipe to start a post with another apology, but I feel it's due. Sorry for 2 soup posts in a row. But this one is so good you won't mind, I promise.

Butternut squash soup is one of those things, like risotto; you order it in a restaurant and love it, but assume it's too complicated to make at home. But, like most vegetable-cream soups, it's simply a matter of vegetables cooked in broth until tender, blended, with some cream stirred in at the end. This recipe, another one adapted from The New England Soup Factory cookbook (working my way through one page at a time), is stunning. It adds apple and parsnip to the butternut base, and it's served with a little bit of gorgonzola cheese to counter the sweetness.

Grocery list: 4 T butter, 2 garlic cloves, 1 large onion, 2 apples, 3 carrots, 2 parsnips, 1-2 stalks celery, 1 2-pound butternut squash, 8 cups chicken stock (preferably homemade, covered before here), 1 T worcestershire sauce, 3 T brown sugar, 1.5 c cream (I used half-and-half and it was perfect and still plenty guilty enough), gorgonzola cheese for garnish.



Start by prepping all the vegetables: peel, remove seeds if applicable, dice.



Melt the butter in a large soup pot over medium high heat, and add all the vegetables. Saute for 10 minutes, then add the chicken stock. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to medium so it's just simmering, and cook until the vegetables are soft (about 35 minutes more).



Turn off the heat, and stir in the worcestershire and the brown sugar. Season the soup with salt and pepper.



Like all cream soups, you want to blend it *before* you add the cream, which is last. So, either with an immersion blender, or by moving batches of the soup to a blender (carefully - and only fill up the blender half way with each batch, so you don't splatter boiling hot soup all over yourself - the things I learned before having a stick blender).



Finally, return the soup to the pot if you've used a blender, and stir in the cream. You might need to turn the soup back on low heat, depending on how hot you like your soup.



To serve, place a spoonful or two of gorgonzola cheese crumbles in the bottom of a bowl, and spoon the soup on top. The book actually calls for an even more impressive garnish (crispy prosciutto and sauteed apple slices), but I skipped it.

creamy broccoli soup

Broccoli soup is the perfect comfort food during a cold spell. It's also as (un)healthy as you want to make it, depending on the toppings you add. The actual soup itself couldn't be easier, as most vegetable-cream soups follow the same premise: cook vegetables in stock, add cream, blend with immersion blender, serve. This recipe that I found on Food Network is perfect. If you want to slim it down, substitute whole milk or half-and-half for the heavy cream, and of course use less than the 1/2 pound of cheddar pictured above.

Grocery list: 4 T butter, 1.5 pounds fresh broccoli, 1 large onion, 1 carrot (note, I skipped the carrot since I used the last ones for my stock), 3 T flour, 4 c chicken stock, 1/2 c cream.



Over medium-high heat, melt the butter in a large soup pot. Chop the vegetables, then saute them until the onions are translucent, about 5-6 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.



Sprinkle the flour over the vegetable base, stir and cook for a couple minutes, until the flour starts to turn golden brown.



Pour in the chicken stock (one quart box of the pre-made kind, or make your own), and bring to a boil. Simmer over medium heat until the broccoli is tender, another 15-20 minutes.



Stir the cream into the soup.



Puree the soup with an immersion blender, then do a taste check, adding more salt and/or pepper if necessary. Serve with grated cheddar cheese (and/or bacon, croutons, crackers, etc).

greek orzo, lemon and chicken soup

After my last post about caramelized shallot mac-and-cheese, one AHB reader reminded me that more new year's resolutions are about eating healthier, not necessarily eating more mac-and-cheese. So, I found a great option in my "New England Soup Factory" cookbook. This broth-based soup is full of protein, and the spinach packs in fiber, iron and vitamins, while the lemon adds flavor without a lot of calories. You can go back for a second (or third) bowl and not feel guilty.

Grocery list: 10 cups chicken stock (will include instructions for making this at home below), 3/4 cup orzo, 4 eggs, 3 lemons, 1 cups chopped cooked chicken, 1 pound fresh spinach. For chicken stock, you'll need a 2-3 each yellow onions, carrots and celery stalks, bay leaves, a few sprigs of thyme, half a bunch of parsley, 5 garlic cloves, a

handful of whole peppercorns, and 2-3 pounds chicken thighs (bone-in and skin-on).



To make chicken stock, put all the ingredients in a large stock pot and cover with water. (Peel the carrots and slice into 2-3 inch pieces; chop the celery into thirds; peel the garlic cloves and add whole to the pot.) In addition to the 2-3 pounds chicken thighs, you can add a whole chicken breast (skin-on and bone-in too), but instead of leaving it in for the full 3 hours, you can remove it when it's cooked for 30-40 minutes. This is the chicken you can pull off the bone and then cube to use in the soup. If you were to leave it in for the full 3 hours, it would probably be too tough to use in the soup.



Bring the stock to a slow boil over medium high heat, then turn down the heat to a simmer. If you opt to cook the chicken for cubing this way, remove it with tongs from the stock pot and allow to cool a bit, then peel the meat away from the bones. Return the bones and the skin back to the pot, so it can continue adding its flavor to the stock. Add more water over time if the stock cooks down. Simmer for at least 3 hours. Allow to cool, then strain in a mesh strainer. You can freeze extra stock in ziploc bags too.



Now, for the soup. Measure 10 cups of your homemade stock into a large soup pot, and heat over high heat to boiling. While the stock is heating, zest 2 of the 3 lemons. Juice all 3 lemons. When the stock is boiling, add the orzo and stir. Cook for 5 minutes.



Beat 4 eggs together, then slowly pour into the stock pot while stirring constantly.



The egg will cook immediately into little fluffy string shapes.



Add the cooked chicken, lemon zest, lemon juice and fresh spinach to the pot, and bring the soup back to a gentle boil.



When the spinach has wilted, turn the heat off, and season the soup with salt and pepper.

chilled avocado and crab soup

In the June issue of F&W, there's an article about "great ways to use guacamole". Normally if I make guacamole, there's never any leftovers that I need to worry about, but since I'm always looking for ways to eat more avocado, I really liked this recipe. Starting with a base of guacamole, you can puree it into this soup, which is actually both creamy and airy (yes, airy -- check out the bubbles in the picture) because of the addition of buttermilk.

Grocery list: 2 avocados, 1 lime, 1 clove garlic, 1 jalapeno, 2 scallions, cilantro, buttermilk, 1 bottle clam juice, and about 1/3 pound of jumbo lump crab meat.


Start by making a basic guacamole. The recipe in F&W suggests roasting the scallions, jalapeno and garlic first, then mashing everything into the avocado. Since I was only making this for the soup, I went with as little effort as possible, mincing everything (note -- I only used about 1/3 of the jalapeno - a whole one per 2 avocados would be pretty spicy). I squeeze half the lime into the mixture along with a generous amount of sea salt, and some chopped cilantro.



Next, put the guacamole base (should be about 1 cup) into a blender with 1 cup cold buttermilk, 3/4 cup bottled clam juice (one bottle is 8 ounces usually), 1/2 cup ice water, and the rest of the lime juice. Puree until smooth, then season with salt and pepper. Pour the soup into bowls and top with jumbo lump crab meat. The recipe also calls for a creme fraiche and fried tortilla strip garnish, but the soup was rich enough that I left it out.

tortellini soup

This is an incredibly simple recipe that is usually easy to throw together with staples in the pantry/freezer. It's not too heavy but still qualifies as "comfort food." Grocery list: one onion, one bag of spinach, a few cloves of garlic, 2 quarts of chicken broth and some tortellini.



Start by sauteeing an onion and a few cloves of garlic in olive oil, add 2 quarts of chicken broth and bring to a slow boil. Add tortellini (freezer, fresh, or dried versions all work), about 3 or 4 servings, and cook according to package directions. Just about a minute or 2 before the tortellini or done, add a 9 ounce bag of fresh spinach. Serve with a squeeze of fresh lemon juice, lots of cracked pepper, and a sprinkle of grated parmesan.