Roasted Carrot Soup

Another vegetarian gem -- and this one I created purely on my own, no other recipes consulted or adjusted or used as inspiration. Instead, the inspiration was the veggies!

Ingredients

• Carrots, three sliced for roasting
• 1 Potato, cubed
• 2 small turnips, cubed (if you don't have turnips or don't want to use them, you could probably add another potato and an additional carrot or two)
• 2 shallots, diced
  
• Vegetable stock or broth (1/2-1 quart, depending on how thick you want it)
• Cumin
• Olive Oil
• Curry powder
• Salt and pepper

Preparation

1. Slice carrots for roasting - once sliced, place on a cookie sheet and drizzle with olive oil, then sprinkle salt, pepper and cumin (toss to coat evenly)
2. Roast at 450 degrees for about 20 minutes (start checking it at 15)
3. While the carrots are roasting, chop the other ingredients
4. Sautee shallots in olive oil (for about 5 minutes)
5. Add potatoes and turnips and cover with vegetable stock/broth - I only had 1/2 quart of stock, so it ended up being a thick puree, but I found I really liked it that way.
6. Cook until tender (typically about 15)
7. Combine ingredients in a food processor or blender (I use a blender, since I don't have a food processor) and puree. (You may need to stop and stir it around a bit to get everything to puree evenly). I recommend adding a bit more cumin as well as some curry powder during the puree process (I just add a little at a time and taste, instead of measuring).
8. Enjoy!

As you can see from my blog, I'm really getting into soups. They are easy and a great way to use a variety of vegetables (I had never used turnips before) and you can get several meals out of one batch or freeze some for later. This makes soups great for a new mom like me.

Coming soon -- my first attempt at making curry/Indian food and a blog about stock - making your own and store bought.

Winter Vegetable Soup with "Chorizo"

It's Vegan! Really!! I used Soy Chorizo (from Trader Joe's) and Veggie Stock. For people who eat meat, you could, of course, use pork chorizo or sausage and chicken or beef stock.

Ingredients

• 2 medium-sized carrots, diced
• 1 shallot, diced
• 1 small onion, diced
  
• 1 turnip, cubed/diced
• 1 potato, cubed
• Chorizo or Sausage (soy variety or meat, depending on your preference)
• Approx. 1 quart of vegetable stock or broth (or chicken or beef stock, if you prefer)
• 1 can kidney beans
• Thyme
  
• Salt, pepper
• Olive Oil

Preparation:
1. I chopped all the vegetables first and set them aside and then cooked up the chorizo over medium heat with olive oil in the pan. Then I set the chorizo aside.
2. In the same pan (as the chorizo was cooked), I cooked the turnip, carrots, onion and shallot in olive oil over medium heat for about 5 minutes.
3. Next, put the cooked vegetables in a crock pot with vegetable stock and turn on low.
4. Again in the same pan (you could use different pans, but I have a 3 1/2 month-old and no dishwasher, so I simplify), cover the potatoes in water and bring to a boil. Cook until tender.
5. Once the potatoes are tender drain them and add to the crock pot along with a can of kidney beans.
6. Add chorizo to the crock pot as well.
7. Add thyme, salt and pepper (this is all to taste)
8. Turn crock pot on high (I probably had the pot on high for an hour or so)
9. Switch to low (I did this when I left the house and left on low until I came home at the end of the day, at which point I just switched it to warm).

You don't have to make this in a crock pot. You could cook the soup on the stove for 40 minutes to an hour and be ready to serve it. The crock pot is just so easy that I used it instead. I also added some quinoa to the soup, which I had in the fridge. I think rice would also work well in this soup.

I love coming home to a warm pot of soup at the end of the day, especially when it is cool out. I hope you enjoy it as well!.

Healthy Side Dish or One-Pot Meal

A quick note on my potato leek soup, I made a vegetarian/vegan version recently, which required 2 simple changes. Just sautee the onions and leeks in olive oil instead of butter and use vegetable stock or broth instead of chicken broth/stock. The recipe already avoided the use of cream.

Tonight a made a Spicy Green Bean/Kale recipe that could be used as a side dish, but I added some left over quinoa I had and it became a yummy (and healthy) one pot meal.

Also, you'll notice in my blog that the same ingredients having been popping up, that's because my cooking right now, thanks to Abundant Harvest Organics, is centered around the produce I get in the box and because I like to use what I have on hand and not waste (by throwing things out before they get used or by wasting gas on a trip to the grocery store that might be avoided by adjusting recipes and using what I have).

Tonight's recipe was my take on Giada's (Everyday Italian) recipe. Remember, my portions are scaled, roughly, for 1 (or 1 with some leftovers), which is one way my recipe differs from hers. I also removed and added a few ingredients (she had mushrooms, I do not. I have bell peppers, shallot and garlic, she did not).

Ingredients

• Olive Oil
• 1 shallot, chopped (diced)
• 2-3 cloves of garlic (chopped)
• 1/3 pounds green beans
• salt and pepper (to taste)
• white wine vinegar
• chicken or vegetable broth
• (optional) a trio of bell peppers, in strips (red, yellow and green) - I like to always have the frozen package of these from Trader Joe's on hand, It's a great addition to lots of recipes or to jarred pasta sauce (and so easy and affordable).
• 1 1/2 packets of red pepper flakes (from the pizza place - yep, that's what I had. This is obviously amateur cooking).
• 2 handfuls (I have small hands) kale rinsed, stemmed, and roughly chopped (I actually just tear my kale)
• 1/2 of a lemon (to juice)
• Parmesan cheese (to top it off)
• chives/green onion (to top it off)

Preparation

1, Warm the olive oil in a large saute pan over medium-high heat. (I used enough olive oil to coat the pan)

2. Add shallots and cook until translucent, about 4 minutes.

3. Add garlic, cook for just about 1 minute, then add broth, enough to cover the pan and keep garlic from burning.

4. Add green beans (I used frozen, but fresh would obviously be better. If you only have canned, I wouldn't even bother. I like string beans, not cut beans.), salt, and pepper and cook for 2 minutes.

5. Add a dash of white wine vinegar (Giada suggests white wine, which is probably better, but I didn't have it, so I used the white wine vinegar instead, since I already had some broth in there I think it worked fine). and continue cooking until the green beans are almost tender, about 3-5 minutes.

6. Add the red pepper flakes and the kale and continue cooking until the kale has wilted, about 4 to 5 minutes.

If you want to serve it as a side, squirt lemon juice on top (from half a lemon -- don't over use) and sprinkle with parmesan cheese.

To make it a one-pot meal, I added my leftover quinoa to the pot while the kale was finishing cooking, just to warm the quinoa, and added the lemon juice and parmesan cheese once I had put a serving in a bowl. I also added some chives on top.

I think this would also work on top of rice or tossed with pasta, in which case you might also want to drizzle with some olive oil at the end.