Graziano tuscan stew

I feel turrible (my favorite Charles Barkley word) about about last week, I really do. Left you with a SNAFU on Thursday, promised this fine mouthful of the best soup I've ever made (according to Main Man) to end the week on, and then I left you hanging allllll weekend. Shame on me. If you're involved in this snow system that's been moving around the midwest all weekend, I would be extra upset at me at this moment...this stuff is the perfect thing to have simmering on your stove all day watching the white stuff fall. I was pretty sure we were done with all this Winter crud with the birds chirping in the mornings last week, and daylight savings time springing ahead on Sunday, but I guess Mother Nature and Old Man Winter wanted another roll in the hay before giving up for the year...

Looking at these pictures makes my soul do a little hippy dippy dance. This was pretty much a perfect Saturday in my book...yoga in the morning, a light lunch, nice and sunshine-y day outside with a chilly nip in the air, and an afternoon of cooking! If I have time on the weekends, I generally try to prepare our dinners for the week as much as possible so that there is less cook time and clean up during the week. I love the feeling of having a clean house and a full fridge with dinners planned on Sunday night before getting into the weekly grind. I'm type A like that...

Anyway, I was making a few meals for the following week and noticed I had some graziano in the freezer as well as some veggies in the fridge that weren't slated for digestion in other recipes and probably needed to be used before they were wasted. Soup always comes to mind when I have extra veggies on hand, and why not have some soup simmering while I'm in the kitchen to make my other meals anyhow? I intended to use the noodles that are pictured, but the pot got so full I didn't have room for them...which was sort of a happy accident because the soup was very vegetable-y and lighter than I think it would have been with carbs plopped in it. Here's what you need:

1 lb Graziano sausage (It's a brand of spicy italian sausage made by Graziano Brothers in Des Moines, IA if you've never heard of it...Main Man has actually told me if he got propositioned by a Graziano daughter, he would have a hard time not leaving me to join that family...I've got my eye on those girls!!)
1/2 bag baby carrots, chopped (about 1.5 cups)
1/2 white onion, diced
1 red bell pepper, diced
3-4 celery stalks, diced (or about 1 cup)
3 green onions, diced
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 T crushed red pepper
1 T dried basil
8 oz spinach leaves
1 (15.8 oz) can mushrooms, drained
1 (15.8 oz) can great northern beans (canneloni beans would work as well), drained
1 (46 oz) can tomato juice
1 (48 oz) container chicken broth
1 (15.8 oz) can fire roasted tomatoes, with juice
salt and pepper to taste

 

Obviously, you start with dicing all your veggies up. I had the Graziano sausage and minced garlic browning in a skillet as I chopped.  On another burner, I had a large pot that I added the chicken broth and the tomato juice to in order to bring it to a boil while I was chopping. When the liquid is boiling, add all the chopped veggies and let boil for 5 minutes. Bring the soup down to a simmer and add the cooked sausage and garlic, as well as the spices to the pot. Let simmer covered for anywhere from 1-4 hours, I went about 3 hours with mine. The longer you simmer, the better the flavors will melt together and reach one fabtastic taste profile vs. everything tasting like its individual state.

 

Main Man came home from doing some errands and was raving about this stuff! He said it was by far the best soup I've ever made, and it might be in his top 5 of favorite things I've made to date. That's a pretty aggressive assessment for a soup, especially for a meat and taters man like my hubs. The best part is smelling the soup simmering all afternoon though...nothing smells like home more than soup simmering on the stove on a chilly day. Serve with some dippy bread and have yourself a little warm up in this little snowstorm we've got going on...hopefully it's our last!!

 

No matter how great a soup is, Main Man and I would take a full week to eat a batch this large, so I always freeze a large portion of it to pull out and simmer on another chilly day. They are dated and labeled, and I'm pretty excited to surprise Main Man one of these coming days with another dose of his new favorite soup with no extra effort at all from me. I win! Happy Monday, all...

Chicken and gnocchi soup

If you live in the midwest, you've no doubt been hearing the rumors of the monster snowstorm that is supposed to happen upon us the end of this week. Unless you live under a rock that is, and if that's the case, I hope your rock has central heat. It's getting chilly up here, which is sad after last week's temperatures that made Spring seem just around the corner. No worries, I have a pretty exciting plan to simmer some soup and scrapbook all the livelong days away while I'm snowed in...which will happen if we get as much as they're chattering about. Twenty inches is nothing to fool with, so I won't even attempt to get anywhere besides my living room that day...

 

I get just as excited for snow days now as I did when I was a kid, but for different reasons altogether. Snow is sooooo perdy the first day it falls. After that, I could care less about the nasty stuff, but I love to sip on hot cocoa and watch the big white flakes fall out the window, as long as my house stays at a perfect 72 degrees throughout. Main Man is always out plowing, so he doesn't get to run the heat on snow days :) I do not, however, want anything to do with going sledding or building snow forts/men in the yard. Maybe I will be more fun in the cold when I have kids of my own to play with in the white stuff, but for now, I'll view the beauty from the winda.

 

This soup came together out of an excess amount of veggies in the fridge problem...my carrots were getting to look pekid, my green onions were starting to slime up, and I have no use for celery after a veggie tray has been demolished (celery is one veggie I don't use much). So, I made soup! I've been dying to make a soup anyhow, as I went through sort of a phase this Fall where I made tonnnnnns of different varieties (check out skinny loaded baked potato, beef mushroom and quinoa soup, and cheesy veggie chowder for a few new faves) but have now eaten our way through our frozen stock. Being a food hoarder is great, but it gives me anxiety to have an empty freezer...

 

Also, I read Iowa Girl Eats religiously, and she always mentions putting a cheese rind in your soups for extra flava flav. I've never done it before, mainly because I never remember to save my cheese rinds (just pop them in a freezer bag and keep them in the deep freeze until you're ready for them), so I wanted to give it a shot now that I have a pile of rinds in my freezer. Main Man is constantly flabbergasted by the things I choose to save and freeze :)

 

 

 

Tiny little addition, tons of awesome flavor! I used a Greyere cheese rind this time...

 

Gnocchi is my new thing lately, I want to make my own sometime, but for now we're sticking with the store bought stuff. Notice it's cholesterol free for my Main Man!

Here's what you need...

4 chicken breasts, seasoned, cooked, and cubed
2 cups chopped carrots
3 cups chopped celery
1 cup diced green onion
1 cup diced white onion
4-5 cloves minced garlic
3 cups fresh spinach
1 cheese rind (if you have it)
1 package potato gnocchi (1 lb)
1 large can chicken broth
1 cup skim milk
salt and pepper to taste

Bring the broth to a boil, and add all the veggies (besides the spinach) and the cheese rind to boil until they are almost tender, about 6-8 minutes. Add the gnocchi and boil until chewy but firm, about 6 minutes. Turn the soup down to a simmer and add the spinach, salt and pepper, and skim milk. Let simmer for 10-15 minutes, or until flavors meld. I like to let my soups simmer for a couple hours, but if you're hungry, get on in there! Soups are always better the next day, in my opinion though.

Serve with fresh cracked pepper and saltine crackers. Mmmmmm Mmmmmm Great...Campbell's has got nothin' on our snowday soup! P.S. Aren't those little soup bowls with cracker holders just adorbs?? I promise I won't say adorbs again, so you don't break my thumbs. But, gaaaahhhhhhh! My friend Bea gave them to me for Christmas and they give me a warm fuzzy in my heart region :) Happy snow week, all!!

Jalapeno popper chicken chili

Happy Valentines day, blogosphere! Or, if you're Main Man, Happy E. Coli from organic baby spinach day...yeah, it's been a fun week around this joint. Did ya'll hear about the recall on certain brands of baby spinach? If you haven't, and you have some in the fridge, check HERE to make sure you don't have to throw yours out like I did. Is it bad that I'm sort of upset at having to throw out an almost $7 tub of organic spinach? I love spinach! I use it in tons of recipes and we eat spinach salads on the reg. I guess that's why this sucks so bad. But I guess I should count my blessings, as I have had no symptoms whatsoever (although I hear they can come up to a week later, but I also hear some people just don't show symptoms so I'm hoping for the latter rather than the former). Anyway, it really puts a damper on the sweet meal I had planned for the evening in with my new lover of a hubby. We also are trying reschedule our weekend getaway to a Bed & Breakfast that we were signed up to do a murder mystery dinner at on Saturday night! I have really been looking forward to this, people...so I'm really hoping they can sell our reservation and reschedule us! Stupid spinach. Here are a couple of the items we made last year for V-day...just in case you need last minute ideas:

 

Toasted quinoa salad with baby scallops

Baked parmesan tomatoes (these are seriously amazing and so easy!)

Crab legs

 

On to some more fun news...this recipe is ahhhhhmazing! We had a chili cookoff for our friend Tony's surprise 30th birthday a couple weekends ago at our place. Tony was the judge and he's not one for a lot of spice, plus I knew there would be a ton of standard chili recipes there and wanted mine to stand out. I saw this recipe a while ago on Bev Cooks, I've told you about her blog before...she's pretty much my idol. I love reading her writing and feel like she's in my head sometimes...it's weird. Anywho...her jalapeno popper chicken chili was a favorite at the party, although not by the birthday boy judge :( I had quite a few people ask for the recipe so here it is!

 

2 T olive oil

1/2 medium red onion, finely chopped

1 red bell pepper, finely chopped

2 jalapeno peppers, finely chopped

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 lb ground chicken

2 T taco seasoning

1 (14.5 oz) can black beans, drained and rinsed

1 cup corn (I used a can of shoepeg corn)

1 (14.5 oz) can Muir Glen diced tomatoes

1/2 cup chopped cilantro

4 slices bacon

4 oz cream cheese (I used fat free)

1/2 cup shredded mexican cheese (I used 2%)

1 pinch course salt and freshly ground pepper

 

Heat the oil in a large skillet. Add the onions, both peppers, and garlic. Saute until the veggies start to soften, about 4 minutes. Add a pinch of salt and pepper.

 

 

Add the ground chicken and brown all over, 5 minutes or so. Add the taco seasoning and continue to cook another minute. Add the beans, corn, diced tomatoes, salsa, broth, and cilantro. Bring to ta light simmer and cook 30 minutes. While the soup simmers, cook the bacon and roughly chop into crumbles. Add the cream cheese, bacon, and shredded cheese to the chili and stir until melted and creamy.

 

I simmered my chili for a bit and then added it to a crockpot to be served for the evening, and forgot to take pics of it when it was first done. The following pics are leftover so the chili appears more chunky than it was when it was originally served. It still had sinful flavor though, and don't kid yourself into thinking I didn't finish that bowl after making it to take photos. Garnish with cilantro, bacon, jalapeno, sour cream (or greek yogurt), salsa...whatever your heart of hearts wants in its caverns for the day...and enjoy! As with most chili, it's better the next day so I didn't even need toppings.

You know it's a hearty chili when it holds your spoon up in it! A lot healthier than normal chili with the subs of chicken for beef, black beans for red beans, etc. I would highly recommend this if you're looking for a chili that's outside the box!

I should mention that this didn't take a prize out of the 11 entries we had that night. But Main Man's chili recipe did take 3rd place!! I will also mention that I made Main Man's chili that day so it's really my 3rd place ribbon using his recipe...in case we're counting 3rd place ribbons, which I don't think anyone does.

Mr. Greg Loeffelholz took first prize that night though, so maybe someday I will try to finagle his recipe out of him and post it for you...I know that it included Graziano sausage and bacon. You pretty much can't lose with those two ingredients.

Skinny loaded baked potato soup

Things to make life easier, from me to you:

1. Good pots and pans make a happy cook...I never knew what a difference nice pots and pans made until we got some using gift cards from our wedding. Wowza.

2. Making soup is a freaking spectacular way to use up old veggies. I've had leftover veggies from veggie trays at get-togethers a lot recently. I haaaaate (like literally loathe) throwing out good food. That's the problem with my garden actually...I have so much extra, and there's no way I can use it all even if I cooked day in and day out. I tried to find a place to donate, but the food banks around here don't take produce. Something about the FDA approval and produce going bad quickly...whatev. Anyway, long story short...I hate to waste veggies. So I put them in soup. The end.

3. If you want to bake potatoes faster than lightning, use the microwave. I don't know why I never knew this before. I always used to bake them for an hour in the oven wrapped in foil. No more. See instructions below, and copy them every time you bake a tater. You're welcome.

4. Get a microwave cover thingy (see below). I grabbed one (total impulse buy in the checkout lane) a couple weeks ago and can't even explain to you how much it changed my life. My brother has been living with us for a month, and with Main Man working long hours, it seems no one has the time to cover their shizz when reheating dinner. Enter splatter guard. Leave it in the microwave, and they use it! They actually use it! Can you hear the angels singing in the background?

5. Make soups on the weekends. It's so calming to have soup stewing on the stove while you go about surfing the internet and drinking hot chocolate doing laundry and dishes like a good wife. I now have 6 soups frozen in my freezer. I may need to open a soup kitchen for the holidays to get rid of my stock. This was one of the better and easier soups to make that I've done recently, so it's a good one to start with if you need a beginner soup. I'm here for you.

4 large russet potatoes, washed and dried (or the equivelant of that in small yellow potatoes like I used)
1 small head of cauliflower
3 cups fat free chicken broth
3 cups skim milk
1 cup greek yogurt
8 oz reduced fat cheddar cheese (freshly grated melts best)
6 T chopped green onions or chives
7 slices bacon, cooked and crumbled (could use turkey bacon)

Pierce potatoes with a fork and microwave on high for 5 minutes. Turn over and microwave another 5 minutes, until tender. Cut potatoes into small, bite-sized pieces with a knife.

Steam cauliflower with water in a lare covered pot until tnder. Drain and pulse in food processor with 1 cup of chicken broth. Add back to pot. Add remaining chicken broth as well as all other ingredients. Add salt and cracked pepper to taste and allow to simmer and mix for 15 minutes. Serve with sour cream, cheese, bacon bits, chives, etc on top...or don't, it's no skin off my potatoes.

Main Man came home that Saturday afternoon for a little break from working and grabbed the bowl below after I finished photographing. Ate the whole thing. I'd say that's a raving review since he had already had lunch.

 

Beef, mushroom, and quinoa soup

I've been on a bit of a soup kick lately. If I'm being truthful, that's an understatement. My name is Abby and I have four types of soup frozen in my deep freeze. Hiiiiiii, Abby.

 

I don't consider it a problem though. I mean, Winter is well on its way according to my thermometer and the number of layers I have to wear to leave the house lately. And as much as it pains me to say it, there are a few things that are nice about my most loathed season. It's super pretty for the first snow (after that it's all dirty and brown and I'm ready for Spring), I love having the fireplace on in the evenings for that cozy feeling of relaxing before bed (the fireplace use is frowned upon in the Summer months), and cuddling up to a nice piping cup of hot chocolate or bowl of homemade soup is truly one of the most comforting feelings in the world when it's frosty out the window. If you live in a place where you don't experience Winter, I'm mostly jealous of you, but I also feel a teensy bit bad that you don't get the experience of being snowed in and not have to shower for 2 days at a time while scrapbooking your little heart away and drinking spiked apple pie mugs until a nap on the couch is seriously inevitable.

 

Anywho...back to my soup problem. I don't know what it is about this year, but I've never made more soup in my life. I've always had a couple go-to's that I make a few times each Winter and freeze the rest for later because the batches just can't be small for some reason. Truth be told, a lot of them are better after thawing and reheating, the process melds the flavas even more than simmering all day for some reason.

 

My mom's chicken noodle soup is my absolute specialty, and I just realized when I was searching to link the recipe here that I haven't posted it yet. Blasphemy. I can't believe one of my most made, most loved, and oldest recipes (I seriously think it was one of the first things I made on my own) hasn't made it here yet. I think I just always assume I have posted it already? Anyway, I'll get on that soon...pinky swear.

 

Besides Mama K's chicken noodle soup, my most made soups are by far her tortelini soup, and my variation of her chicken noodle using beef, my beef noodle soup. But this year I have stumbled upon a few other amazing soups to slurp that I am head over heels about...one being my Aunt Kris' tomato basil soup and my most favorite soup of all time that I've made at home to this date, the cheesy veggie chowder.

 

So a couple Saturdays ago (the week before the wedding, as if I had nothing better to do) I decided to fill up my deep freeze with a couple more soups for the winter, like any good food hoarder would do to procrastinate stuff that really needed to be done. I made the staple chicken noodle to get rid of a ton of veggies I had leftover from a party, and decided I would do a beef soup as well, but wanted to sub the noods for some quinoa (my other creepy obsession this year) since I had heard it is just as fabtastic in soups as it is in everything else. Enter the world of beef, mushroom, and quinoa soup and prepare to never want to leave.

 

1.5 cups uncooked, rinsed quinoa

1 small onion, diced

3 green onions, diced

3 cans mushrooms

1 large beef roast

2 bay leaves

2 large can beef broth, plus an extra one to add after simmering when the quinoa soaks up the liquid

cracked pepper to taste

 

"Let's get this soup party started" said no one, ever. Except for me, right there. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees, slather your beef roast in olive oil as well as a little salt and cracked pepper to taste. Cook your beef roast until done. I went for about 30-40 minutes, and cut into the roast to make sure there was no blood. It doesn't need to be over done, because it will cook more in the soup.

 

While the roast is baking, bring your 2 large cans of broth to a boil on your stovetop. Add the bay leaves and quinoa to cook, stirring continuously for about 10-15 minutes while boiling. Add the onions and mushrooms and turn the soup down to simmer for another 15 minutes.

 

Cut your meat into bite sized pieces and add it to the soup as it simmers. I usually let it rest a few minutes after baking, so you don't lose all the wonderous juices, but you can also dump the juices into the soup for more flava if you hate waste. Float your own boat, ya know!?

The soup is done once all ingredients are added and simmered for a while but it honestly only gets better the longer its allowed to stay out and party on the stove. I had two soups partying at once...I'm crazy like that.

Bowl it up and serve! I enjoy buttered bread with soup, rather than crackers. Crackers go with chili but bread goes with soup in my world...you can choose how your world works, but I'm telling you that my world is pretty sweet.

I'm honestly not sure how I came up with this recipe, it all just sounded good together. I almost added more veggies but thought keeping it simple would be best. It turned out very well, Main Man was a fan when I woke him from his nap with a steaming bowl of it. Food in your face the instant you awake from a peaceful slumber = one of the only acceptable reasons to rouse a husband "watching" football on a Saturday afternoon. I win :)

Sidenote: the big gallon sized ice cream containers work perfectly to freeze soups if you have them. Mama K saves them for me from the nursing home she works at when they have ice cream socials, which leads me to feel the need to fill them up with soup to freeze. See, it's not even my fault!

Cheesy veggie chowder

Do you ever come home and just neeeeeed to cook? Like you had such a crappy day, that all you wanna do is slice and chop and stir and season and make something yummy so that you can feel like something decent came out of the craptastical mess of a day? Oh, you say I need therapy? This is my therapy, folks. As any good food hoarder knows, it gave me a sense of peace inside to use up my almost-going-bad veggies in the fridge, have a meal in the freezer for later, and work out my stress in a productive way...all at the same time! I don't really remember what got my goat that day (Is that not the weirdest saying ever?? What goat? I don't have a goat to get.) but I do know that it all melted away into this big pot of soup.  Waaaaaaay cheaper than a shrink, people. Give it a shot...you can send me the money you would've spent at therapy if it helps :)

I doubled this entire recipe and froze it. You can keep it singlified (Is that a word? Eh, you knew what I meant...) if you want, you can eat it right away if you want, you can cook it all and throw it in the garbage disposal if that's the way your therapy works...no one is judging here. I will tell you that it puts a nice little cozy, sleeping-bag-lined corner in your heart, where you can go and hide when you have another bad day, to know that you have a big batch of homemade soup to throw on and enjoy when your therapy is needing to sit on the couch and veg rather than be productive. Different days call for different therapies, my friends...we all know that!

I used half of my doubled batch to serve to some friends who came over for dinner and girl talk...and I can tell you that this soup is mom-approved, toddler approved, and main man approved. I don't know who else's stamp of approval you would even need...the only person really missing there is the Pope.  Get yo tush to therapy!

2 T butter
1/2 cup chopped onion
1 cup finely chopped carrott
3 stalks celery, finely chopped
1 T minced garlic
4 cups chicken broth (I use low sodium)
2 large baking potatoes, chopped up
1 T flour
1/2 cup water
2/3 cup milk
2 cups chopped broccoli
2 heaping cups shredded cheddar cheese

Melt the butter in a large soup pot. Add onions, carrots, and celery to saute until tender. Add garlic and cook for an additional 2 minutes. Add chicken broth and potatoes and cook until potates are tender. Mix flour with water, add, and stir soup until slightly thickened. Add milk and broccoli and cook until broccoli is tender and soup is heated through. Stir in cheese and allow to melt. Top with extra cheese and bacon bits if you feel the need like I did...

If you freeze it, you may need to add a little milk or half and half when you're reheating in order to give it that creaminess again...a cup or so should do. You could add ham to this if you want some meat in your soup as well. Just suggestions...it's perdy perfect as is.

P.S. The warm, cozy, sleeping bag spot is still in my heart corner knowing I have the other half of this batch and a batch of the tomato basil soup hanging out together in my hoarding nest (a.k.a. my deepfreeze) together waiting for the next cool day where a soup craving slams me in the face. I hope you find a cozy corner and some free therapy this weekend...happy Friday, all!

Tomato basil soup

I think I've told you about my most prized possession before. It is a cookbook my mom sent around to all our family members before I left for college, so everyone could write their favorite family recipes for me in their own handwriting. It has my late Grandma Mary's handwriting in there, it has my late Grandpa Jim's dictation of how to make his Sunday chili, it has Big Dan's famous stinkbait recipe....and I cherish the whole kit and kaboodle. I've cooked out of it a lot, I've even shared some with you, like Aunt Nicki's chicken pot pie.

 

Well, for my recent bridal shower in Rochester thrown by my cousin Betsy on the Kratoska side, I received an equally special gift in the form of a cookbook with more handwritten recipes from a lot of family I didn't have included in the original book. I have a post in the works about the amazing spread Betsy had laid out for us at the shower and will share some pics of the great weekend as well. I'm so excited to start making homemade apple pies with my new pie dish and apple corer, I look freaking goooooood in my new apron (Main Man says so), and I just couldn't wait to make the first recipe in the book to get good use out of the new soup tureen and bowls I received!  This recipe came from my Aunt Kris, and it was given to her from the head chef at a corporate building she worked at in Minneapolis before she moved to Arizona and begged him for it. This is a lightened up version of that soup but it is scrumdiddlyumptious, even if it skinny!

 

4 (14 oz) cans diced tomatoes

2 carrots, finely chopped

2 small onions, finely chopped

4 stalks celery, finely chopped

5 cloves garlic, minced

1 bay leaf

olive oil

1 quart milk (I used skim)

1/2 cup fresh chopped parsley

1 cup fresh chopped basil

1/2 cup flour

1 cup heavy cream (I used half and half)

1 t salt (I omitted this)

1 T sugar (I omitted this)

1 teaspoon cayenne (or to taste)

1.5 jalapenos processed to liquid in the food processor (I added this myself)

 

Saute all veggies and garlic in soup pot in olive oil until soft. Puree 3 cans of tomatoes, bay leaf, and jalapenos (if added) in food processor. Add this and remaining can of diced tomatoes (with juice) to veggies. Heat on medium. In separate bowl whisk together 2 cups milk and all the flour. Pour into tomato mixture and stir while thickening. Add remainder of milk and cream. Stir well. Add salt, sugar, and cayenne if using.  Simmer on low to medium heat at least 20 minutes to allow flavors to meld. Stire frequently to preven burning of milk and cream. Just before serving, add parsley and basil. Stir and serve (Makes about 16 cups).

 

I actually used my own tomatoes from the garden, blanched, peeled, and processed them in the food processor until they were the consistency I wanted...mainly liquid with some crushed chunks. You don't have to go to that amount of work unless you are a food hoarder and hate wasting your organic veggies rather than buying food. I also ate this for 2 nights with a sore throat from my puh-monia and froze the rest to thaw and enjoy when it gets a little cooler in the Fall. How awesome is it to have homemade soup to enjoy without having to do the work to get it?? Spectacularly awesome, that's how awesome. Main Man liked this way better than the roasted tomato soup with grilled cheese croutons, although he did say some grilled cheese croutons would be a nice addition. We'll see if he's lucky when I thaw this out...

  

Oh, how cute are you...I could just eat you up. And then I did :) Happy Thursday, all!

Beef noodle soup

This is one of my favorite cold day recipes, so it's sort of sad that we haven't had that many cold days this Winter, up until last week with the big snowfall we got. I said "sort of" because it's not really that sad...I would take warm Winters over any comfort food, but I did miss this soup! 

The base recipe is my mom's chicken noodle soup that she used to make for us as kids, I just switched it all to beef.  I still make the chicken noodle soup as well, but Justin seems to enjoy the beef better so it's a great thing to have a huge pot of it in the fridge for him for lunches during the week.

3-5 lb beef roast

2 bags no yolk egg noodles

2-3 cups carrots, cut up

2-3 cups celery, cut up

1 onion, diced

2 large jars beef broth (low sodium kind)

2 resealable containers beef broth

3-4 bay leaves

This is a very simple recipe to make on a cold Saturday afternoon.  As you can see by the ingredient list, you can add as much or as little of each veggie as you would like. Just throw your roast in the oven to bake at 375 for 1-1.5 hours or so, until it is a medium rare in the center. Dice your vegetables now. Put the 2 large jars of beef broth in a stock pot to bring to a boil with your bay leaves, and then add your vegetables to the pot. Cook at a rolling boil for 5-7 minutes, and then add the frozen noodles and boil for another 5-7 minutes.  Dice up your beef into bite sized pieces and add to the pot, now simmering for as long as you'd like.

The more it simmers, the more the noodles will soak up the broth, so you will have to continue to add more....but the more the noodles soak up, the better the soup will be, so this is a "good thing", as Martha Stewart would say.

Inevitably, the leftovers are better than the first bowl...I think the noodles break down a little after the soup cools and gives it a more substantial broth.  Whatever the reason, this is one of those recipes that gets better and better each day after it's made. I simply keep some beef broth in the fridge and keep adding it to the pot as the noodles soak it up.  This makes a fairly large batch so freezing it works perfectly so you don't even have to mess with making it next time!  Enjoy :)

These photos are a little blurry as the steam from the soup was fogging up my lense...but the taste of this soup with some oyster crackers and fresh cracked pepper is to die for, blurry pics or not!

Chicken tortilla soup and beer bread muffins

This is not really a recipe, but more of an easy dinner solution if you need one. One of my girlfriends kids was selling Tastefully Simple products for her dance class, so I ordered a couple of things in order to help out.  I have had their beer bread before with their dips, but thought it might go well with their chicken tortilla soup.  Since Winter has officially sprung upon us, it's soup season fo sho! 

I got the value pack of beer bread, which contains 3 packages to make a loaf of bread. I, of course, do not bake...so I didn't have a bread pan, hence the beer bread muffins.  They took a little less time to cook but tasted just as good, and they're awesome served warm with a little butta on them...but just as good dipped in soup :)  All you have to do is mix a packet with a can of beer, and pour into your pan to bake (350 degrees for 15 minutes).  Nothing more to add...

Sidenote: Sam loves these little muffins for some reason...who knew dogs liked beer bread??

The soup was just as easy, I just added water and brought it to a boil while I baked 2 chicken breasts in the oven to shred and add to the soup.  I also added a can of black beans to bulk it up since we had the Hofers over for dinner that night (which Cynthia proceeded to pick out anyway, haha)...the box was a perfect portion for 4 adults.  So if you've never tried Tastefully Simple products before (and no, I am not a rep for them, nor do I sell their products), I would highly recommend both of these for a home cooked tasting meal done in less than 30 minutes (all but 5 minutes of that time being hands off). 

(Wow, that was a lot of parentheses!)

If you're interested in their dips, which are flipping amazing by the way, I have the Garlic Garlic and the Onion Onion.  Both are super good for parties and tend to get annhilated as long as I don't use the fat free mayo and try to skinny them up...light works well though. Their seasoned salt is pretty stellar as well...now if only I could get them to give me some free products for advertising their website?? 

http://www.tastefullysimple.com/

If you go to the website, you can find a consultant to order from near your area.  Let me know if you try anything new that I should know about!! 

Oyster stew

I promise, after this one, the weird holiday recipes (dumplings, scalloped oysters) are over!  Then it's on to more crowd pleasers, rather than pleasers of just 3-4 people at our large holiday gatherings.  This is the first year I tried my hand at oyster stew...it's been offered at the Jamison family Christmas each year, and I believe the only ones that eat it are Gary and Marvin.  There are 25 people there and those are the only two that like it, so Cheryl makes it special for them each year.  Then I came along!  There is now a third oyster stew eater in the house, so I decided I better try to make it for Big Dan and Gary when we had our mini-Christmas at our house this year.

Cheryl gave me her recipe and it sounds easy enough. It seems as though its just milk, butter, and bugs (that's what Justin calls the swimming oysters).  I used canned oysters although Cheryl said she usually uses fresh, and I didn't taste a difference. I don't believe there's much difference in price, the place I went for groceries just didn't have fresh.

The only complaint I got was that it needed a little more butter (I tried to cut down on that without them knowing and got busted).  Also, I noticed that you can't just let the soup sit there and simmer on the stove because the oysters get too cooked and begin to fall apart, getting an even slimier texture....if you can imagine that. So serve it hot and when you're done, turn the heat off until you're ready to serve again. Reheating doesn't hurt it but overcooking does.

2 T flout

1.5 t salt

1 t Worcestershire sauce

dash bottled hot pepper sauce (I used Tobasco)

1 pint shucked oysters, undrained

1/4 cup butter or margarine

1 quart milk, scalded

Blend flour, seasonings, and 2 T water in a 3 quart soup kettle. Add undrained oysters and butter. Simmer over very low heat 3-4 minutes till edges of oysters curl, stirring gently. Add hot milk; remove from heat and cover. Let stand 15 minutes. Reheat briefly, and serve piping hot and with oyster crackers....duh!

All in all, I think it turned out well for my first time and will keep this in my recipe box for special occasions when both dads are hankering for oysters!

Roasted tomato soup with grilled cheese croutons

6 cups cherry tomatoes
3 T olive oil
1 t salt
1 t pepper
2 T butter (I used light)
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 cup chopped onion
1 can diced tomatoes (I didnt have this so I diced up 2 large tomatoes)
4 cups chicken broth (I used low sodium, low fat)
1 cup whipping cream (I used fat free half and half)
I also added 1/2 cup fresh basil, diced up

Heat the oven to 400 degrees.  Toss the cherry tomatoes with 2 T of olive oil and salt and pepper, then transfer to a baking sheet in a single layer. 

Roast the tomatoes until they are shriveled with brown spots, about 30 minutes.

In a large pot, heat the butter and the remaining T of olive oil over medium heat. Add the garlic and onion and saute until softened, about 6 minutes. Add the canned tomatoes with their juice (or the diced tomatoes with their juice), the broth, the basil, and the roasted tomatoes, including any liquid on the baking sheet. Bring the mixture to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer, covered, for 40 minutes. How flipping pretty is that??

Using a food processor or blender, puree the soup until its smooth.

Return it to the pot and stir in the cream (or half and half). Without letting the soup boil, warm it over medium heat, stirring often, until steaming. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Make yourself some grilled cheese croutons for serving! If you don't know how to do this, don't worry...when I went to college I didn't either. I had no idea you had to butter the bread!  So here's a quick tutorial in case you were a lazy kid like me who left the burning of the grilled cheese to your mom:

1. Butter one side of each piece of bread
2. Lay bread buttered side down into greased skilled
3. Layer cheese on top of that (I used one slice of American and one slice of Swiss but Pepperjack is killer in there if you have it)
4. Throw your other piece of bread on top, buttered side up. I usually sprinkle each buttered side with some thyme for a little flava.
5. Don't burn them like Mama K always did (sorry for calling you out, Mom)! Keep checking the bottoms and flip when golden brown.
6. When cheese is melted and toast is perfectly browned, you have just made your first grilled cheese. 

It sounds easy, and it is...but it really is quick to burn so be careful!

Cut our grilled cheese up in bite sized pieces once it cools for a few minutes so the cheese doesn't ooze out....that would be catastrophic!  Throw them into your steaming soup and serve immediately so they don't get super soggy...

Justin is always a huge fan of grilled cheese, so he was easy to please with that aspect.  He wasn't real up on the tomato soup though...he said it's just as easy and good to eat the Campbell's Select tomato basil we usually do..and he's correct.  BUT I had cherry tomatoes up the wazoo and any good food hoarder knows you shouldn't waste food when there's starving kids in Etheopia! I really liked it though, maybe due to the feeling of accomplishment of making my first soup besides chicken or beef noodle...who knows.  I will tell you that soup weather is upon us whether you like it or not...so this really hit the spot in front of the fireplace that night!  But you decide for yourself....

Broccoli cheese soup

So this is kinda cheating.  I don't make this from scratch...not even slightly.  But I had to pass this on to you so you could go buy it....ok, I'll wait till you get back.
Who doesn't love cheese soup? I think it's Justin's fave if I were to nail him down on a soup commitment.  I will say this is not diet soup, so I apologize if I got your hopes up for it being low-cal.  But you know how when you're sick and you want soup, but you don't want to make it from scratch? This was how I discovered the bagged cheese soup.  Stopped at the store on the way home to get some kleenex, some meds, and some soup...came out with this.

I just follow the directions on the package (which you only need 8 cups of water to make, by the way) and it's done in 10 minutes...seriously.  I have also been known to add a couple slices of real diced ham (not the lunchmeat stuff) since we have Wilbur frozen in the deep freeze, to give the soup some girth (did she really just use the word girth to describe food? Yes, she did.) and some staying power.  I made this for tailgating this weekend since it's going to be chilllllllllly (except it wasn't chilly at all, it was legit hot out for the end of October)!!  Nothing warms ya up like a bowl of soup and crackers...and even though it was warm out already this did get demolished so I would say that's a good sign!

Light lasagna soup

Mrs. Michelle had a soup contest at work.  Mrs. Michelle wanted to win.  Mrs. Michelle wanted to try a different soup than the standard chicken noodle or chili recipe she thought everyone else would try.  My obsession with Pinterest finally paid off when she asked if I had any good soup recipes...although I hadn't given this recipe a shot yet, literally everyone and their mother had pinned it and the pictures looked TO DIE FOR! 

I will let her text message to me the night she made it do the talking...."Oooohhhh mmmmyyyyy ggggoooodddd Abby! If people don't pick my soup they don't deserve to have tastebuds! The lasgna soup is freaking out of this world!" 

Endquote. And I didn't add any of the extra letters for effect, those were all her.  So, needless to say, I will be making this as soon as I can get my butt to the store to get the ingredients, but thought I should pass it along to you all as well since it seemed to be such a hit!!

Ingredients:

2 teaspoons olive oil
1 pound Italian turkey sausage, casings removed
1 onion, chopped
1 green bell pepper, chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 (32-ounce) container chicken broth
1 (15-ounce) can tomato sauce
1 (14 1/2-ounce) can petite diced tomatoes
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper
4 ounces broken whole-wheat lasagna noodles (about 4 noodles)
1/2 cup chopped fresh basil
3 tablespoons grated parmesan cheese
1/2 cup reduced-fat shredded mozzarella cheese
8 Whole-wheat breadsticks or grissini (optional)

Instructions:

Heat the oil over medium-high heat in a large nonstick saucepot or Dutch oven. Add the sausage, onion, bell pepper, and garlic. Cook over medium-high heat, stirring occasionally, until the sausage is crumbled and browned, 8 – 10 minutes.

Add the broth, tomato sauce, diced tomatoes, salt, and crushed red pepper. Bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer, stirring occasionally, until the flavors are blended, about 20 minutes. Add the noodles; bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer, uncovered, stirring occasionally, until the soup thickens slightly and the noodles are tender, 10 – 12 minutes. Serve with the breadsticks, if using. (whole-wheat lasagna noodles take a little longer to cook.)

Fat Stats:
Per Serving (1 cup) 225 Cal (27% from Fat, 42% from Protein, 31% from Carb); 23 g Protein; 7 g Tot Fat; 2 g Sat Fat; 2 g Mono Fat; 17 g Carb; 2 g Fiber; 4 g Sugar; 108 mg Calcium; 3 mg Iron; 826 mg Sodium; 53 mg Cholesterol