Tag: soup

Fresh Vegetable Stock – For Free!

Today I made another batch of “free” veggie stock! I love doing this.

I save all my veggie scraps in a gallon zip-lock bag in the freezer: carrot peels/ends, onion ends, fennel fronds/stalks, celery ends/leaves, broccoli ends, parsley/herb stems, etc. I don’t save too many cruciferous veggies like cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, as they can overpower the stock flavors.

Anyway, once my gallon bag is filled, it’s time to make stock. I dump the whole bag (frozen) into my 7qt cast iron pot, along with a handful of homemade dried celery leaves, then I add water to cover (today I used 14 cups) and simmer. You could probably add other dried herbs too.

I didn’t want it to boil too quickly, so I slowly heated the contents on the stove, and after about 1.5 to 2 hrs, I moved the pot from the stovetop to a low-heat oven and simmered for another hour or so.

I carefully removed all the bigger veggie pieces, then strained the rest in a colander. Then strained once more to remove all the teenie bits using a fine mesh strainer. It made just about 14 cups, almost filling 4 qt sauce pot.

I used the stock today to make bacon lentil veggie soup. Yum. But it can easily be frozen like any other stock.

Pacific Natural Foods Soups – Why All the Sugar?

When I visited Whole Foods Grocery last week, I was planning to purchase a carton or two of soups from Pacific Natural Foods. They were on sale for $2.79 and Whole Foods was offering a $1 coupon.

pacific natural foods creamy tomato has lots of added sugar

Personally, I like Pacific Natural Foods as a company. They are independently owned, unlike Imagine Foods, which is owned by Hain. I try to choose chicken broth from Pacific, but I have purchased Imagine brand when it’s a better bargain.

So, I thought this will be a great opportunity to try another soup flavor, and I thought the creamy tomato would be a good choice. When I saw the stack at the Whole Foods store, I casually glanced at the list of ingredients and was shocked to see evaporated cane juice was added, making the total sugar 12 grams.

List of Ingredients:
Organic Reduced fat milk
Filtered water
Organic tomato paste
Organic evaporated cane juice
Sodium citrate
Sea salt
Organic rice flour
Organic cheese flavor
Organic garlic powder
Organic onion powder
Organic white pepper

I initially thought it was only that particular soup, but nope, I checked every single blend, and they ALL had evaporated cane juice.

Why?

Aren’t tomatoes and/or butternut squash sweet enough without adding more sugar to their recipe? Even the French Onion had added sugar!

Are we THAT addicted to sugar, that we can’t even get away from it in our natural soups? Do we really need extra sugar and salt to make our food taste better? sigh. :(

The worst part is that a lot of healthy eaters probably trust Pacific to produce a quality healthy product, and probably don’t even bother to check the list of ingredients. I know I don’t always check, but I’m glad I did this time!

Needless to say, I was very disappointed and did not buy any Pacific Natural soups. Bummer.

Nana’s Chicken Soup from New England Soup

First let me say that it’s difficult for me to say anything negative about local food products, but I really wasn’t happy with Nana’s Chicken Soup from New England Soup company.

I purchased a couple of pouches of soup at Market Basket a few weeks ago, to keep on hand when I didn’t have anything planned for my lunch. I finally ate the soup the other day for lunch, and it was a great disappointment.

I wasn’t thrilled with the texture, but the worst part was, it was virtually flavorless. I wasn’t necessarily a lack of salt, although it’s got a lot less sodium than most commercial soups, it was just a lack of deep flavor that develops when you make homemade soup. It just tasted like water.

Unfortunately I ended up dumping most of it in the trash. Very disappointing.

I still have a pouch of black bean soup, but I don’t know if I’ll just donate it to the food bank, or give it one more shot.

I might be apt to give it one more try, because the New England Soup company really looks promising! I love how they have an ingredient tracker on their web site. It seems they really do care, and they are trying to create a healthy alternative to the other commercial canned soups.

Oh well, just so disappointing.

Spicy Fennel Tomato Soup Recipe

bowl of spicy fennel onion tomato soup for dinner

I’ve borrowed the new Gwyneth Paltrow cookbook from the library – “My Father’s Daughter: Delicious, Easy Recipes Celebrating Family & Togetherness“.

I started reading and was immediately intrigued by the recipe on page 58 – “White Bean Soup: Two Ways” – I had a fennel bulb in my crisper drawer and was stumped on how I was going to cook it. So many other fennel soup recipes called for multiple bulbs, but this recipe only needed one fennel bulb!

I made a lot of alterations to the ingredients, but next time I’ll definitely stick closer to the original recipe and include the beans so it’ll be a complete meal! But I did really like my addition of both canned and sun-dried tomatoes.

If you’d like to take a gander at Gwyneth’s original recipe, it’s available at various locations online.

The soup is just as delicious in its original chunky form:
chunky spicy fennel onion tomato soup-before blending

Or you can blend it with an immersion blender
spicy fennel onion tomato soup-after blending

I had purchased Applegate Farms turkey franks as training treats for the dogs, and since I only had a can of baked beans, they were a perfect combination with the soup.
along with the soup, I made franks and beans

Recipe: Spicy Fennel Onion Tomato Soup

Makes 3-4 servings

Ingredients

1 Tbsp Extra Virgin Coconut Oil (or olive oil)
1 bulb fennel, chopped
3 smaller “spring” onions or 1 large regular onion, chopped. (Leeks work well too!)
1 carrot, chopped
cayenne chile powder or flakes to taste – I used just a pinch, and it added a perfect spice undertone.
5 pieces of sun dried tomatoes, chopped
Small can of unsalted diced tomatoes – about 1 1/2 cups
salt/pepper to taste
1-2 cups water
Optional: 1/4 tsp of tumeric and/or paprika spices.

Directions

  1. Heat large soup pot over medium heat. Add the coconut oil, then fennel, onions, and carrot. Turn heat down to low, and cook until softened, about 20-30 minutes.
  2. Once the vegetables become soft and sweet, add a few Tbsp of water and scrape up the browned bits at the bottom of the pan.
  3. Add the rest of the water, plus the chile, tomatoes, salt & pepper, then simmer on very low for about 30-40 minutes (I used a gas diffuser to really reduce the stove heat)
  4. Once the soup is finished, you can leave it chunky or use an immersion blender to puree to your preferred consistency.

Nutritional Data

Use the nutritional data as a guide; the info is not absolute, your results might vary considerably depending on your ingredients. I left out the sodium data since it can vary so much.

Calories: 124
Total Fat: 5g
Saturated: 4g (from the coconut oil)
Cholesterol: 0
Carbs: 17g
Fiber: 5g
Sugar: 6g
Protein: 3g
Vit A: 68%
Vit C: 65%
Calcium: 9%
Iron: 12%

This soup tasted awesome the next day for lunch! Oh I love this soup!
leftover fennel onion tomato soup for lunch the next day

UPDATE 2011-05-11: Made the soup again tonight, adding freshly made (dried) navy beans. I baked a couple of Whole Foods chicken sausages to slice into our bowls of soup; paired with a large salad of baby greens, this was a perfect dinner. Really low calorie too!

A few days ago, I made a batch, but added too many potatoes, and they overpowered the soup’s flavor. Potatoes are a great addition, but only when you add one or two at the most!

Eggplant Parmesan Soup

I found a fabulous soup book at the library!

New England Soup Factory Cookbook: More Than 100 Recipes from the Nation’s Best Purveyor of Fine Soup is written by a local woman who operates two restaurants in the Boston area. I’ve never heard of her restaurants, but the book looked interesting with gorgeous photos and glossy pages, so of course I borrowed it!

Now that the cooler weather is upon us in New England, I’m starting to crave soups & stews. I was thrilled to find a whole bunch of intriguing recipes to try in the book, but the Eggplant Parmesan Soup (pg 51) really caught my eye. I knew I’d be getting some eggplant in the CSA share this week, so I made a commitment to myself to make the soup!

Continue reading “Eggplant Parmesan Soup”

Soups and One Pot Meals Cookbook Review

This is a review for the cookbook Soups and One-Pot Meals the 100 Best Recipes from around the World by Christian Teubner (1998)

The first thing I noticed about the recipe design is that the ingredients list was centered making it a little more difficult to read. Plus more multiple ingredients were sometimes listed on one line, making it even more difficult to comprehend.

The photos in the book are gorgeous. I love cookbooks with lots of photos and this book doesn’t disappoint. Every recipe has beautiful professional photos on its pages.

The book starts off with stock recipes, and then is divided into countries/regions. A few recipes include photos with every step but unfortunately, it’s difficult to see the details because the photos are too small.

Personally I don’t know how many recipes I would actually make, but there are a lot if great ideas to take to your own recipes, and the price is right at the Amazon.com marketplace. With shipping, you can grab a used copy of this book for under $5.

Disclaimer:
I love reading cookbooks, like some people love reading novels! I am inspired by recipes, and enjoy learning ideas from cookbooks; I like putting my own spin on a recipe rather than exactly following it. Please keep in mind that my opinions might be completely different from the other home cooks.