Jewels of Spring

I can hardly wait for the farmer's markets to open every spring.  Not only do I love the fresh fruits and vegetables, I'm also always on the lookout for a new variety or an unfamiliar food to try.  My local market has a lot of fruits and vegetables that you won't find in any store - I just ask the grower what they are, what they taste like, and how to cook them.  Most are very accommodating and will even give you a taste.  It's a great way to expand your horizons.  We also like to visit farmer's markets when we travel -  they're great photo ops as well as interesting places to buy local items to bring home.  (The picture at the top of my blog is from the market in Aix-en-Provence, France.)

Two of my spring favorites are familiar to everyone - asparagus and rhubarb.  I discovered a great recipe for an elegant Asparagus Soup that I want to share.  Since that's such a classic dish, I decided to feature something a little more off-the-wall for rhubarb than your typical muffin or crumble.  How about Chicken with Rhubarb Sauce?  Now that's different, as they say in the midwest.

First the asparagus soup - thickened with leek, zucchini and potato, it has a more complex flavor and is healthier than a cream of asparagus soup.  It's a really easy recipe if you have thin asparagus, otherwise you peel the stalks which takes a long time.  Try to avoid that unless you're feeling a need to be punished for something.

If you have a lot of asparagus or your asparagus is too thick for the soup recipe, check my blog archive at left for April (Asparagus Tart), January (Chicken and Asparagus Stir-Fry) and March (Spring Risotto) for other ideas.



On to the chicken with rhubarb sauce - boneless chicken thighs (or boneless skinless breasts if you prefer) flavored with orange, ginger, sherry, honey, cardamom and rhubarb. I served it over white rice and topped it with some fresh pea shoots I found at the market for fun.

* * click here for a printable Asparagus Soup recipe * *

Asparagus Soup
Serves 4 to 6

Note: potato and zucchini help thicken the soup and give it a creamy texture without any cream.

2 lb (two bunches) thin asparagus
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 leek, white and light green parts only, sliced and washed
1 large potato, peeled and cut into large dice
3 cups chopped zucchini (about 2 large)
4 cups vegetable stock
Salt and pepper


Trim the woody ends off the asparagus, then cut off the tips and reserve. If your asparagus is thin there’s no need to peel the stalks, otherwise they should be peeled to ensure the fibrous exterior doesn’t get in the soup. Cut the stalks into 1 to 2 inch pieces and set aside.

Bring some water to boil in a saucepan, add the asparagus tips, reduce the heat and simmer covered for 4 minutes. Remove from the water and immediately immerse the tips in ice water to stop cooking. Drain and set aside.

Heat the olive oil in a soup pot and sauté the leek for a few minutes. Add the potato, zucchini and asparagus stalks and continue to sauté for a few more minutes. Add the vegetable stock, bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer, covered, for 15-20 minutes until the vegetables are tender. Puree the soup in a blender, working in small batches to prevent an explosion of hot liquid, and return to the soup pot. Taste and adjust salt and pepper, then add asparagus tips and bring to a simmer again before serving.



* * click here for a printable Chicken with Rhubarb Sauce recipe * *

Chicken with Rhubarb Sauce
Serves 4 to 6


8 boneless skinless chicken thighs (or can substitute chicken breasts)
Kosher salt
Black pepper
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 medium shallots, fineloy chopped
2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh ginger
1 teaspoon ground cardamom
½ cup dry sherry
1 cup low-sodium chicken stock
¼ cup honey
¼ cup fresh squeezed orange juice (from about 1 medium)
1 pound rhubarb stalks, medium dice

Preheat oven to 375d.

Season chicken thighs with salt and pepper. Heat the oil in a large oven-proof skillet or sauté pan over medium heat. Place half the chicken thighs in the skillet and cook until golden brown, about 4 minutes per side. Remove and repeat with the other half of the chicken.

Reduce the heat to medium-low and add the shallots, ginger, and cardamom. Season with salt and pepper and sauté until the shallots are soft, about two minutes. Pour in the sherry, scraping the bottom of the pan to release any brown bits, and reduce the liquid by half (about 3 to 4 minutes). Add the chicken stock, honey, and orange juice and stir. Add the chicken and any accumulated juices to the pan, turn the chicken to coat, and bring to a boil.

Place the pan in the oven and cook until the sauce is vigorously bubbling around the sides and the chicken is cooked, about 35 minutes. Remove from the oven, scatter the rhubarb pieces between and around the chicken, and return the pan to the oven until the rhubarb is knife tender, about 15 minutes more.

Wild Mushroom & Wild Rice Chicken Soup

Last Year's Post: Very Lemon Chicken and Fruited Couscous

It's Still Soup Weather
I saw a picture for a wild rice chicken soup recipe a while back that intrigued me because it was broth based, not cream based.  I like cream soups as much as anyone but they're not the healthiest option, so I used that recipe as inspiration for creating my own.  The challenge I gave myself was to create a deeply flavorful, earthy and nutty soup minus the cream that is substantial and satisfying enough for dinner with some French bread.  After discussions with The Lawyer and a co-worker (thank you Nancy P!) I decided the key ingredients would be wild mushrooms, wild rice, fresh thyme, leek, shredded chicken, and a combination of chicken and beef broth.  The beef broth turned out to be key because it darkens the color and adds richness to the flavor of the soup.  No pale broth here!

I was really pleased with the results.  The soup is healthy yet very satisfying, and it was the perfect solution for Sunday dinner when we had gone out to a fancy restaurant the night before for a birthday celebration and over-indulged.

The original recipe was featured in an article on different ways to use rotisserie chicken, which is why the chicken was precooked and shredded as opposed to being cooked in the soup.  I liked the concept of shredded versus cubed chicken, plus it makes the soup really fast to prepare.  You can buy a rotisserie chicken or roast a chicken breast in advance.  The salad bar at my local store carries shredded roast chicken which was the easiest option of all.

The other advance prep work is to cook the wild rice.  After those two steps, the soup only takes about 30 minutes to prepare.  (I thought about cooking the wild rice in the broth itself, but was concerned that it would turn into wild rice broth and become overwhelming.)

I decided to use a combination of cremini and shiitake mushrooms, but you could also add portobellos if you like.  I read somewhere that you're supposed to scrape out the dark gills on portobellos so they don't turn your broth muddy, and that seemed like too much work.

It really does seem like a lot of mushrooms, especially after they're sliced, but they do shrink a lot when they cook and they are a key ingredient.

I always use low-sodium products including the chicken and beef broth here, so I ended up adding a teaspoon of salt to the broth.  Different packages of broth vary widely in their sodium levels, so be sure to check the label so you have a general idea before adding any salt to the recipe at all.  Always taste and adjust seasonings in small increments.

I really hope you try this recipe, because I'm pretty proud of it.  Dorky, but true.

click here for a printable recipe

Wild Mushroom & Wild Rice Chicken Soup

Serves 6

¾ cup uncooked wild rice

1 tablespoon olive oil

2 tablespoons butter

16 oz baby bella (cremini) mushrooms

3.5 oz shiitake mushrooms

1 leek, white and light green parts cleaned and thinly sliced

Salt

¼ cup Madeira or Marsala

4 cups low-sodium chicken broth

4 cups low-sodium beef broth

Pinch garlic powder

¼ teaspoon pepper

½ -1 teaspoon salt (start with the lower amount and adjust to taste)

1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme leaves

1 tablespoon chopped fresh Italian parsley leaves

2 cups roast chicken, shredded

Snipped chives (optional)

Rinse the wild rice thoroughly and place in a medium saucepan with 4 cups of water.  Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer for 45 minutes.  Drain and set aside. 

Clean the mushrooms and remove stems, then slice thinly.  Heat oil and butter in a soup pot over medium heat.  Add the mushrooms and stir to coat.  Cook 2 minutes, then add the leeks and sprinkle the vegetables lightly with salt. Cook and stir 3 minutes, until vegetables begin to soften.  Reduce heat to medium-low, and let vegetables sweat 5 to 7 minutes, stirring occasionally, until mushrooms darken and their juices have cooked off.  Add the Madeira and cook until evaporated, scraping up any browned bits on the bottom of the skillet. 

Add the beef stock and chicken stock to the saucepan.  Add garlic powder, pepper, ½ teaspoon salt and herbs and stir.  Increase heat to medium-high and bring to a gentle boil.  Add rice and chicken; stir and heat through.  Adjust salt and pepper to taste.

Serve garnished with snipped chives (optional).

Lentil Soup with Spicy Italian Sausage

This soup is just perfect for a cool fall day - it's warming and hearty with rich lentils, spicy Italian sausage and a wonderful mixture of vegetables.  Serve it with some crusty bread and you have a rustic feast that will warm you from the inside out.

It's easy, it makes a lot and freezes beautifully, and it's very healthy besides being completely delicious - you can see why it's one of my favorite soups.  Be sure to use spicy Italian turkey sausage because it really makes a difference.  Regarding the lentils, I actually used the remnants of three different packages when I made it this time (I collect lentils) so the specific type doesn't really matter.  If you can find the small green french lentils called "lentils du puy" I would suggest adding some for a quarter or third of the total amount of lentils.  They retain a nice firmness that adds texture to the soup but used exclusively they won't thicken the soup properly.  If you can't find them or don't want to buy two different varieties, don't worry about it.  The soup will be perfectly delicious anyway.

Although it doesn't take all that long to make, I like to make soup on the weekend and have it ready for that worst day of the week when you know you're going to come home brain dead.  Even on that day you should be able to manage heating soup and bread, right?

It certainly came in handy recently as we returned from a trip to Africa and had no idea where we were or day it was.  To show you my mental state, the morning after we returned I woke up and heard a noise outside the window and thought to myself, "it must be the baboons".  These are the days when you need soup.


* * click here for a printable recipe * *

Lentil Soup with Spicy Italian Sausage
9 main course servings

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 lb spicy Italian turkey sausage, removed from casings
1 large onion, chopped (about 3 cups)
2 large carrots, peeled, chopped (about 1 ¾ cups)
2 large parsnips, peeled, chopped (about 1 ¾ cups)
1 large celery stalk, chopped (about 1 cup)
2 ½ teaspoons dried Italian seasoning
1 lb brown or green lentils, rinsed
3 quarts (or more) low-sodium chicken broth
1 5-ounce package baby spinach
Shredded parmesan, optional


Heat oil in a large pot over medium-high heat. Add sausage and cook until browned, crumbling as it cooks, about 5 minutes. Using slotted spoon, transfer sausage to a bowl. Add onion, carrots, parsnips, celery, and Italian seasoning to drippings in the pot; cook until onion is translucent and vegetables begin to soften, stirring often, 7 to 8 minutes. Add lentils; stir to coat. Add 3 quarts broth. Bring to a boil; reduce heat to medium and simmer until lentils are tender, stirring occasionally and adding more broth by ¼ cupfuls if soup is too thick, 20 minutes.

Add sausage to soup and simmer until vegetables are tender and flavors blend, 10 to 12 minutes. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Stir in spinach. Cook until spinach is wilted, about 3 minutes.

Serve topped with shredded parmesan, optional.

Chicken Noodle Soup - The Ultimate Comfort Food

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How to be a Soup Fairy
It might seem odd to post a recipe for chicken noodle soup at the holidays.  But here's my reasoning - you're probably going to have some time off over the next few weeks, right?  Why would you want to spend some of it making soup?  Because it's a really good bet that a friend or family member is going to come down with a bad cold or flu in the next month or two.  Just think how happy they'd be if you were able to whip out a container of homemade chicken soup as a get-well present.  You'd get big-time gold stars for thoughtfulness (not to mention think-aheadfulness).  I was planning to make this soup for blog purposes a week ago when I saw a Facebook post by my friend Kathy that said she had a lousy cold and felt like "caca".  It would have been even better if I could have brought her soup immediately but I was able to stop over the following day (after I actually MADE said soup) and she was very grateful.

Making homemade soup does take some time, but you can spread it out over two days (recommended) and it doesn't take more than an hour or two each day.  Plus, if you have various family members hanging around the house you can enlist their aid and it makes a fun project to do together.  Really!  Your house smells wonderful and you feel like you're doing something to help someone else - very appropriate at the holidays.

The big secret to this recipe is the noodles.  Don't buy dried noodles, buy frozen egg noodles because they're just like homemade.  They make a homemade soup seem even more homemade.  Kathy later asked me "did you even make the NOODLES?"  I had to confess.

Day one you cook the chicken, which creates the broth.  You let the broth cool in the refrigerator overnight so you can skim off the fat the next day.  Day two is all about chopping ingredients and dumping everything into the broth to cook. 

By the way, this recipe makes a LOT of soup - about four quarts.  The good news is that you'll have plenty for yourself as well as others.  But be aware that if you try to make it in a standard Dutch oven you might run into problems.  You need a real soup pot.

Do you like my pot?  I love nice shiny pots. If you don't have one, borrow one from a friend or make half a recipe in a Dutch oven. Or buy one and use it often.

This recipe includes an optional small amount of cream and parmesan.  They really add to the flavor but you can leave them out if you're being careful about calories.  My rationale is that the cream makes the soup more slidey for sore throats (technical term).

If you're watching your sodium intake, know that you can buy chicken base in a low sodium version.  I'm not sure if the same is true about chicken bouillon cubes.  As a general rule of thumb I always try to use low sodium products whenever available and then salt to taste at the table.  You'll end up using less sodium that way.  Not familiar with chicken base?  Here's what it looks like.

You'll find it, along with beef base and sometimes turkey or pork base, in the spice aisle of most grocers (near the bouillon cubes).  I like these products better than bouillon cubes because they seem fresher with more depth of flavor and have less sodium.

I think I had Campbells Chicken Noodle Soup pretty much every single school day when I was in 3rd grade - brought to school in a Barbie lunch pail with a peanut butter sandwich.  It took me a while to recover enough to think about chicken noodle soup again (kind of like when I came down with the flu immediately after having a shrimp dinner, but different).  This recipe will be a revelation for those of you whose soup normally comes out of a can.

Happy Holidays to all!!!!!!



* * click here for a printable recipe version * *


Chicken Noodle Soup
Makes approximately 4 quarts

Step 1:
4 bay leaves
3 chicken bouillon cubes or 3-4 tsp chicken base (preferably low sodium)
1 onion, peeled and diced
1 tsp lemon pepper seasoning
3 cloves garlic, minced
One 2.5-3 lb fryer chicken, cut up
1.5 tsp Italian seasoning
3.5 quarts water
Kosher salt and pepper to taste

Step 2:
2 cups sliced carrots
2 cups sliced celery with leafy green tops
12 oz package homestyle frozen egg noodles
3 tablespoons chopped parsley
1/3 cup cooking sherry
1-2 cups sliced mushrooms
2 teaspoons chopped fresh rosemary
Salt and pepper to taste
¾ cup heavy cream (optional but good)
¾ cup grated parmesan (optional but good)
Additional fresh parsley for garnish


For step one, add all the ingredients to a large soup pot. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer approximately 35 to 45 minutes until the chicken is tender. Remove the chicken and set aside to cool. Remove and discard the bay leaves and onion. You should have approximately 3 quarts of stock. When the chicken is cool, discard the skin and bones and shred or chop the meat into bite-sized pieces. Refrigerate the stock and the chicken separately overnight.

For step two, skim the fat from the surface of the stock and bring back to a boil. Add the carrots and celery and cook for 5 to ten minutes. Add the egg noodles and cook according to package directions. When the noodles are done, add the chicken, mushrooms, parsley, sherry and rosemary. Add the cream and parmesan, if using. Cook for another 2 minutes until heated through. Adjust salt and pepper if needed.