I'm a Teddy Bear! (puree of broccoli soup)

I’m told that I can be cranky.  I’m doing my best to moderate that, anger isn’t my “go to” anymore.   Seriously, in the past, I was one of those chefs that threw things, rolls, pots, sauté pans, rolls, even knives.  The little paring knives get the point across to the waiters, because with a little practice, you can stick them in the wall, right beside their head as they are gabbing instead of running “this %#@& venison to table eight!” I will admit to have been less than pleasant at times. 

But that’s all in the past.  I’m cuddly now.  I like kittens and flowers and puffy clouds.  I decorate with posters of puppies.  Yeah, my heart rate is no longer like that of a hummingbird and my gastric juices are not swirling like Hell Gate.  Life is good, really good, at least until I start looking at recipe web sites.  It’s good to keep up with the competition.  I like to see what the other folks are doing.  It also sets me on edge.

As a professional chef, I read cookbooks like literature.  Honestly, as I page through a cookbook, I know what the food is going to taste like.  Think that’s odd, well I know a bunch of musicians and they can look over sheet music and hear the whole thing, preformed, complete down to every nuance.  My recipe channeling is the same thing.  It is also a curse because, as I read I have the acrid taste of scorched onions or the combination of kiwi and shrimp in my mouth.  I know that the author never made the dish and that the result of following their advice will be horrid.  Some posters just don’t know what they are doing.  That’s OK, they’re not pros, but they are published authors so they should at least test out what they recommend.

One sin that has become so common is the reposting of someone else’s work.  This bugs me.  I’m asking for a little honesty here.  If you wrote the recipe, take credit for it.  Brag!  You have done something spectacular.  If not, tagging something like “Recipe adapted from Simply Recipes” on the bottom of the page doesn’t cover it.  (”adapted” means that they changed the font)  Even the most distracted middle school teacher would bust you for plagiarism if you tried that in the real world, so why is it cool online?

The other thing that works me up is that everyone uses chicken stock in every recipe they can, without thinking about what the final flavor is going to be.  Wouldn’t it be better to make broccoli soup with vegetable stock or water and let the green stuff shine.  Why mask those good ingredients with a reduced stock.  The reason may be the fault of poorly trained commercial chefs who feel that soup base or bullion, that salty, fatty evil substance that substitutes for stock, is included in most commercial recipes, from soup to Waldorf Salad (really, I’ve seen it).  Some chefs see it as a given, necessary to boost the “flavor profile.” 

I want to encourage you to think at the stove.  That’s why today’s recipe is, like the previous recipe for creamy salad dressing, is a chart.  You’ll get a basic recipe for broccoli soup and then a bunch of ways to vary it.  This way, you will have the technique under your belt and won’t freak out if there is no broccoli in the market that day, you’ll just hum along the aisles and grab up something to replace what you originally came for.  You’ll be able to make parsnip soup in the winter and tomato soup when it’s hot out.  While the ingredients may change, the technique will always be there in your back pocket. 

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Puree of Broccoli Soup to serve six

1 bunch broccoli, about 3 cups chopped

1 ½ cups white potato, peeled and diced

1 cup onion, diced

2 tsp. butter

6 cups water or vegetable stock

salt and pepper

Roughly chop the tops of the broccoli.  Deeply peel away the tough outer skin of the broccoli stems.  Chop the peeled stems into ½ inch pieces.

In a heavy bottomed stockpot, over a low heat, melt the butter then sauté the onions until transparent, about 5 minutes.  Season with salt and pepper.  Add the broccoli and potatoes, continue to sauté the onions, potatoes and broccoli until the broccoli has wilted.

Pour in the water or vegetable stock, increase the heat and bring the soup to a boil.  Lower the heat, simmer for one hour, skimming occasionally to remove any proteins that rise to the top.

Puree the soup with a minipimer or pass it through a food mill.  Bring the soup back to a serving temperature, adjust the seasoning with salt and pepper and add an enrichment or serve as is.

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Use the following chart to make a soup of your own.  The process is easy.  Use the Broccoli Soup recipe above as your guide, then choose an ingredient from the chart below to vary the master recipe.  For example, you can make a great soup by substituting 3 cups of chopped spinach for the broccoli.  Additionally, you could make a butternut squash soup with rice as a starch to thicken it.  If you would add ½ cup of heavy cream to your squash soup, that would be a special thing.  If you want to get a little crazy, use 2 vegetables, say 1 ½ cup tomatoes and 1 ½ cup red peppers and thicken it with white beans.  Got it?  Use your head.  Play, have fun with your food.

Vegetable	Starch	Enrichment
carrot	rice,  ¾ cup uncooked	butter, 3 tbs.
spinach onion tomato red peppers celery sweet potato mushrooms parsnips asparagus salsify butternut squash pumpkin yam	ditalini, ¾ cup uncooked pastina, ½ cup uncooked bread, 2 cups diced red or white beans, 1 cup             cooked lentils, 1 cup uncooked	heavy cream, ½ cup whole milk, 1 cup yogurt, 1 cup buttermilk, 1 cup pesto, 3 tbs.

Since You Asked... (quick chicken stock, roasted red pepper soup)

Over the last days a few readers have commented that the chicken stock recipe looks good, but since they normally use canned chicken broth in their cooking, couldn’t they just substitute that for the home made stuff?  There are a number of reasons that I would not recommend that particular strategy.  

Flavor is the big reason to make your own.  Your stock will have a clean chicken taste, even when you reduce it to make a soup.  Secondly, the canned/boxed stuff has all sorts of ingredients.  Really, look at the side of the box.  Do you want chicken and aromatics or is it OK to include dextrose, caramel color, stabilizers, salts, preservatives, thickeners, whey and a bunch of stuff that I can’t spell?  Me, when I die, I want to decompose.  (the decomposition thing may become a theme)

Clarity should count for something.  The stock you’ll make will never come to a rolling boil.  All that fat and protein will be skimmed off the top leaving a crystal clear broth below.  I’ve never seen a commercial stock that wasn’t muddy.  If you use bones you will get double the yield with only a small additional cost.  Finally, chicken stock freezes well, why not make it yourself in big batches.

If you must use canned broth there is a way to fix it.  It involves watering down the canned broth to even out some of the off flavors, then enriching it with aromatics.  Don’t add any additional salt, there’s already plenty in the canned broth.  This isn’t a substitute for the real stuff, but it will do in a pinch.  And since today we are cooking with canned ingredients, there is also a recipe for a roasted pepper soup that has an oddball ingredient that gives it a velvety texture.

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Quick Chicken Stock

1 14 oz. can of chicken broth (or box)

28 oz. cold water

1 carrot, finely diced

½ spanish onion, finely diced

1 rib celery, finely diced

2 cloves garlic, chopped

½ tsp. dried thyme

2 bay leaves

4 black peppercorns

Combine all the ingredients in a large stockpot.  Slowly bring the stock to a low simmer.  Skim any scum that rises to the top.   

Simmer the stock for 30 minutes.  Strain through a fine strainer.

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Roasted Pepper Soup

1 28 oz. can roasted red peppers, drained, chopped, juice reserved

2 qts. chicken stock

½ loaf white bread, crusts removed

1 spanish onion, diced

2 cloves garlic, chopped

3 tbs. olive oil

3 tbs. fresh basil, sliced into thin strips

salt and pepper

In a heavy bottomed stockpot on low heat, sauté the onions and garlic until the onions are transparent.  Season with salt and pepper.  Add the roasted peppers.  Sauté for five minutes, until they begin to brown.  Add the bread, stir to break it up and then add the chicken stock and pepper juice.  Increase the heat and bring the soup to a simmer.  Simmer for 30 minutes. 

Adjust the seasoning with salt and pepper.  Puree the soup with a hand blender or a food mill. Serve hot during cooler months, or chilled in the summer, garnished with fresh basil.