| Ingredients: |
Directions:
Back to the stock… 2 tablespoons butter or olive oil 2 onions – medium dice 2 carrots – sliced thinly 2 stalks celery broken in half 12 parsley stems cut into 1 inch pieces, save the leafy part for something else, 3-5 sprigs of thyme or teaspoon dried 5 cups water Salt and pepper Heat a small stock pan to medium with oil, then add all veg, cook for 3 minutes, stirring occasionally. Cover with water, add healthy amount of salt, well not healthy in a visit to the Doctor sense, healthy as in generous and you still won’t come close to the sodium in canned stock or broth. 3-4 turns of a pepper mill. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low, cook for 20 minutes, turn off heat and cover until ready to use. (You can also throw everything in a slow cooker for 2-3 hours. The color won’t be as rich but the flavor is there.) 3 Potatoes, just like these Roasted Garlic Potato Soup 1 small onion 1 tablespoon butter or oil 3 potatoes – baked potato sized – peeled and cubed 2 heads garlic – roasted as per previous instructions 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar Salt pepper 1 cup cream optional On Caramelizing Onions – Thomas Keller writes that it takes at least 4 hours to properly caramelize onions, the first hour requires constant attention. Lora Brody says it can be done, hands free, in a slow cooker in 12 to 14 hours. Sure? Maybe? Who am I to disagree? For this recipe we want color and a little sharpness from the onion, not onions so perfect that someone will write a 2,000 word essay about them in next quarter’s Gastronomica (Really good Journal BTW). 30-40 minutes should be enough time. Slice the onion thinly, add it to a small sauté pan with oil or butter, cook over medium-low heat, cook the onion until brown, stirring occasionally. Deglaze the pan with water or stock – get all the fond, as the French call it, that colorful, tasty stuff off the bottom of the pan. While onions are caramelizing, place stock (strained) and potatoes in a stock pot together. Bring to a boil and cook until soft – just like mashed potatoes. Add onions, cooked garlic (cloves removed from skin) and puree. I like those immersion/stick blenders for the job but food processors, food mills and blenders all get the job done. It’s not done, you’ll need to fine tune the soup. Taste the soup. It’s going to need something acidic like vinegar to cut through the velvety texture of the potato, but only a hint. Potatoes require salt. Don’t be afraid to season generously. Maybe the soup could use a little richness that only cream or butter can provide. Chopped herbs, maybe – Tinker, taste, test, don’t feel a need to be bound by the recipe above, any soup recipe is just a guideline anyway. My final advice; try not to eat this alone, it always goes better with people. |