Irish Lamb Stew

First of all, I must apologize for these and all future pictures. I only have an old iPhone for most of them, and the pictures are not very pretty. But this stew was quite tasty, so here goes.

You will need:

2 lbs. boneless shoulder of lamb (I'm not sure I used shoulder, but it was mutton and it turned out fine).
2 tbsp. butter
2 c. boiling water
1-2 c. sliced carrots
1-2 c. cubed turnips
1-2 c. cubed potatoes (I used my little purple ones, so I only had to slice them in half of throw them in whole)
1 onion, sliced
salt & pepper as desired


Instructions:
Melt butter in hot skillet
Add lamb and brown on all sides
Stand back some as you add boiling water
Cover and simmer 1 hr.
Add vegetables and simmer 30 minutes more.
Add salt & pepper to taste and serve.

I wasn't sure I'd like this, since it doesn't have much seasoning and I'm not a huge fan of lamb. But it was actually really tasty and everyone liked it. 
 

One Pot Chicken Rice Soup

I know this isn't a very Christmasy meal, but my husband and I both got a cold this week, so when my mother in law said she didn't have dinner plans, I offered to cook. When I looked up chicken rice soup recipes on Pinterest, they all had cooked chicken. Which is fine....if you have some leftover cooked chicken. But we didn't. And who wants to go through cooking the chicken separately, and the rice, and then adding it to the soup (when you're already sick and feeling like a soggy tissue)?

So I tried making it all in one pot.

Ingredients:

1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil

1 medium onion, chopped

2 garlic cloves, minced

2 medium carrots, cut diagonally into 1/2-inch-thick slices

2 celery ribs, halved lengthwise, and cut into 1/2-inch-thick slices

4 sprigs of fresh thyme

1 bay leaf

2 quarts water

1 cup brown rice

2 lb package of chicken (I used legs & thighs, but breasts would be fine, too).

1 bag frozen peas

Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper 

Instructions:

1. In a large pot, add water, chicken, and rice. Add more water if needed to make sure all the chicken is covered. Bring to a boil and cook about 20 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, chop vegetables.
3. Add carrots, celery, onions, oil, garlic, bay leaf, and thyme
4. Cook another 20 minutes, until vegetables and rice are tender. Pull some of the chicken off the bones. It should come off pretty easily.
5. Add the frozen peas, salt & pepper to taste.

This turned out really well! I wasn't sure because all the recipes I found called for cooked chicken and cooked rice. But I wanted to make the whole thing in one pan. And it worked out really well. The rice thickened the broth so it was nice and thick and stew-like, and the rice was perfectly done at the same time as the chicken and veggies. I have never made chicken soup before (except chili verde), but I will definitely make it again. It was super easy and really tasty, and everyone liked it, even my picky son.

Chicken Chili Verde

I made this with the green enchillada sauce I posted yesterday. I got a similar recipe from a friend which used pork, but I didn't have pork, so I went looking for a recipe that used chicken, then combined bits and pieces of several recipes until I had something I could make.

For this, I used:
2 lbs chicken legs (you could use whatever parts you have)
1 can green chilis
2 cans (or 3-4 c. cooked) white beans (I used 1 of navy beans and 1 great northern)
16 oz green enchillada sauce
3 c. chopped green tomatoes
1 can yellow hominy

In a large pot, add the chicken and enough water to cover
Cook until chicken is tender and falling off the bone
add remaining ingredients and cook about 10 mins until tomatoes are soft

Vegetarian Black Bean Soup

This soup was not the most exciting bean soup I've had, but it was a fine meal and we ended up eating it all, so I guess I'd call it a success.

For this you will need,
4 c. cooked black beans (or 2 cans)
1 onion, chopped
2 tbsp. butter
2 stalks celery, chopped
1 1/2 tsp dried mustard
2 tbsp lemon juice
salt & pepper to taste

Directions:
In a cast iron skillet, melt butter.
Add onion and celery and cook until onion is translucent, stirring often.
Put black beans and onion and celery through a food processor.
Return to skillet and heat, stirring occasionally, until simmering.
Add mustard, lemon juice, salt & a lot of black pepper.

Serve in soup bowls with sour cream, cilantro, cheese, or whatever topping you like.

You could also add a ham bone and/or chopped ham to this.

Bean and Vegetable Soup with Kale and Jacob's Cattle Beans

 

This is another recipe I found on Pinterest when we were looking for recipes using Jacob's Cattle Beans. This one was soooo delicious, much better than the pureed bean soup. It was so good I got up in the morning and went to eat the leftovers, only to find that someone else had gotten there first. That's how good this recipe is!
 
 Like always, we adapted to use the things we had on hand. Below is our version. 

• 4 cups cooked beans of your choice (Jacob's Cattle Beans are the best!)
• 1 onion, chopped
• 2 carrots, peeled and chopped
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1 red pepper, chopped
• 1 can tomatoes, or 2 c. fresh chopped tomatoes
• 2 tsp dried thyme
• 2 tsp dried basil
• 1 cup brown rice
• 4-6 cups water 
• 1 bunch of kale leaves, chopped or sliced
• salt and pepper to taste

Instructions

1. Preheat a large soup pot over medium heat.
2. Add the onions, and carrots. Saute about 5 minutes. Add a little water if they start to stick.
3. Add the peppers and garlic and saute until softened.
4. Add the tomatoes, thyme, basil, rice, beans, kale, and water.
5. Simmer about 30 minutes.
6. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Corn Chowder

My husband loves corn, so I planted two good rows this year. Then I waited, and waited...and waited. Finally I thought, this stuff has to be ready! But the ears were all scrawny and pointy. An online resource told me to wait until they were rounded at both ends. I opened one up, just to make sure, and found that it hadn't pollinated correctly, and just about every ear was a dud. I ended up with about 2 cups of corn kernels from all the ears combined. Big bummer.

So, I had just enough from my whole crop to make one batch of corn chowder. Luckily, it was a big hit and everyone loved it, even Mr. Picky-Pants (that's my son, btw). He even ate it as leftovers (...twice!) despite his strict no-leftovers policy. So, it was a big hit. Too bad I don't have more corn to make it again! Oh, well, I'll bookmark it for next summer.

Here's what I used:
4 tbsp. butter, divided
1 medium onion, chopped fine
4 medium potatoes (or 8 small) diced
2 c. corn kernels
3 c. water
3 c. milk
salt & pepper

Heat 2 tbsp butter in large soup pot. Add onions and cook 5-7 minutes, stirring frequently.

I used 8 small potatoes, and they are purple, so be prepared for weird soup colors!

Chop potatoes. I used food processor, but I'm not sure I'd recommend it as it tended to stick.

Add potatoes and water and cook until potatoes are soft.

Add milk, butter, salt & pepper and corn. Cook 5 more minutes, stirring frequently.

Cuban Pureed Bean Soup

As a lifelong on-again off-again vegetarian, I have grown quite fond of beans. They are more of a staple in our household than, say, hamburgers. When I went to college, what I missed most about my mom's cooking (don't we all miss mom's cooking when we go off to college?) wasn't some fancy dish she made, but good old refried beans. So it's a letdown to look in Fannie Farmer and see so very few bean recipes.

My mom grew heirloom Jacob's Cattle Beans this year, and they are soooo good. So last weekend, we were trying to find some recipes to use them in. This recipe was, of course, from Pinterest rather than Fannie Farmer. I've had Cuban bean soup and stew before in several forms, but my mom really wanted a recipe that used pureed beans. Sadly, even Pinterest didn't yield much when I searched for pureed bean soup. But, we found this one for black beans soup, and we had most of the ingredients, so we made due and made changes when necessary.

Here is our adaptation:

• 1-2 c. water or stock
• 3 c. cooked or canned dried beans (about 2 cans, or precooked). We used Jacob's Cattle Beans, but black beans would be good as well, as the original recipe uses.
• 3 tablespoons olive oil 
• 1 large onions, chopped  
• 3 carrots, chopped 
• 1 green pepper, chopped
• 1 red pepper, chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/2 tablespoon ground cumin
• 1/2 c. dry sherry (I didn't have this, so I used cooking wine)
• salt and pepper to taste

Garnishes:
chopped red onion
chopped red bell pepper
sour cream
Or anything else...would have used cilantro if we had it.
 
Instructions: 

1.  Heat oil in large skillet.
2. Add onions, peppers, carrots, cumin and cook 5-7 mins, stirring frequently.
3. Add garlic and cook 1 more minute. 
4. Add sherry or cooking wine and cook until vegetables are tender.
5. Add beans, water or stock, salt & pepper, then remove from heat and puree in a food processor or blender. If you like it a bit chunky, pulse or blend for only a few seconds, checking until it's at desired consistency. 
6. Return to pan and reheat, if desired.
7. Serve in bowls with preferred garnishes.

While it was quite good, I think I'd find another recipe next time, as it wasn't very exciting to me. I've liked other uses for the beans more, and other pureed bean soups better. 

Lentils with Pork or Sausage

This is another of those recipes that I found in Fannie and then ended up adapting so much that I'm not sure it's even based on her recipe anymore. Her recipe was for Lentils and Sausage, and I didn't have sausage, so I used some pork bones for flavor (and boy did they make the whole thing taste like I was eating pork instead of lentils!) and tried to follow the rest of the recipe. It didn't work out that well, as it was WAY dry and I had to double the water. By the time I was done, it had very few aspects of the Fannie Recipe. If I have sausage again, I might make this, but I found it a bit lacking of vegetables and overall a disappointment. It was way too bland for me. I love my lentil soup (I don't have a recipe, but I've made it many times and it always turns out full of flavor) and this was just eh. The next time I make a lentil dish, I will probably not repeat this one.

For this, I used:
1 1/4 c. dried lentils
2.5 c. water
2 small onions, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 potatoes, chopped
1 bay leaf
pork bones OR 1/2 lb. italian sausage, cut in 2 inch pieces

Directions:

1. In a large soup pot, combine lentils and water. 
2. Add onions, garlic and bay leaf. Bring to a simmer.
3. Add potatoes and sausage or soup bones.
4. Simmer 20-30 minutes until lentils are soft.
5. I had to add about 2 c. more water because not everything was covered by the water. It all boiled away, so this is not a soup, but a drier lentil dish.

I ended up putting soy sauce and sour cream and cilantro on this just to make it have some kind of flavor besides overwhelming pork-ness. Seriously, it was like I was eating a pork chop. Couldn't taste anything else!

Mulligatawny Soup

I've heard of mulligatawny soup before, but it was one of those words I'd heard while never really knowing what it was (like vissisous). Apparently it's an Indian dish that made it's way over here a long, long time ago. I looked it up on Pinterest and all the recipes used lentils, but Fannie's uses meat, listed as an optional ingredient. With or without meat, she doesn't mention lentils. Since I was trying to make a FF recipe, I followed hers rather closely, with the exception of using a red pepper in place of celery, since I don't have celery and it would be criminal to buy a vegetable at this point, with my counters overflowing with homegrown organic veggies of all sorts (except the celery variety).

Here's my adaptation for this:

Ingredients:

4 tbsp butter
1 diced onion
1 diced carrot
1 diced green pepper
1 diced red pepper (or a couple stalks of celery, which I didn't have, so I used peppers)
1 diced apple
1 jalepeno, minced (or 1/8 tsp. cayenne)

1 lb raw beef
1/3 c. flour
1 tbsp. curry powder
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
6 c. water (or use beef broth if you have it)
2 crushed cloves
1 large tomato, chopped
salt & pepper to taste

3 c. cooked brown rice

optional garnishes: slivered almonds, cashews, or chilled banana slices. I didn't use any of these. I used some plain yogurt for garnish, because it's what I usually eat with Indian food.

Directions:
Melt 2 tbsp. butter in large pot

  Add vegetables and meat (everything down to the flour) and cook 15 minutes on low heat, stirring often.

 Add other 2 tbsp. butter, flour, nutmeg & curry powder and cook 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Add water, cloves, tomato, salt & pepper and simmer 30 minutes.

Serve in bowls atop rice, with preferred garnish.

I'm not a huge fan of Indian curry, so I wasn't crazy about this, but it was okay. My husband liked it well enough, and my son ate it one day as well. Since it makes a big pot of soup, we ended up having it for dinner a couple times, though my son requested a cheese sandwich the second night we had this. It's a good soup if you like curry. Otherwise, I'd skip this one.

Cream of Tomato Soup

This was AFTER adding 3 more cups of tomatoes.

This is a simple, easy recipe that I made one night when I was feeling very uninspired. I paired it with grilled cheese sandwiches for the classic combo.

This recipe was pretty alright. But it was more like cream soup (think chowder) than the cream of tomato soup you get at restaurants or from a can. I ended up going back and adding more tomatoes because I didn't care for the white-pink milkiness of the soup.

Here's my adaptation:
4 tbsp. butter
1 small onion, chopped
4 tbsp. flour
4 c. whole milk
1 bay leaf
1 tsp. sugar
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. baking soda
3-6 c. chopped tomatoes (canned or fresh)


Melt the butter in a large pot over low/med heat.

Add the onion and cook until soft.
Sprinkle the flour over the mixture and cook 1-2 minutes, stirring.

Add milk slowly.

Add bay leaf, sugar and salt and continue stirring until mixture thickens slightly.
 
Add baking soda to tomatoes, then add to milk mixture.
Continue cooking until soup begins to simmer.
Remove from heat and run through food processor or blender (or strainer/sieve)

Fannie calls for only 3 c. tomatoes, but I did not care for the milk soup. So I added twice that, and it was still very pale and creamy. So I'd go with at least that much. My husband and son both loved this soup, and since I canned a TON of tomatoes this summer, I'm sure I'll make it again this winter after a long day at work when I need a quick recipe.

All gone!

Minestrone

Since my family is Italian, I can be pretty picky about Italian food. I have made minestrone a few times, trying to perfect it so it's just like my mom's. I finally got it perfect last summer, but I thought I'd give Fannie's version a shot anyway. It wasn't as good as my mom's, but I was pleasantly surprised that it was pretty good, since some of her recipes have come up way short. After all, no one can cook like our moms. That's the whole reason I picked this cookbook when I decided to undertake this whole learning-to-cook adventure.

Onward to my adaptation of Fannie's minestrone.

1 c. dried white beans (I used Great Northern)
4 quarts water
tsp salt

Onions in the pot with herbs.

1/4 c. olive oil
1/4 c. butter
tbsp dried parsley flakes (or handful fresh)
2 onions
1 tsp. thyme (fresh if possible)
4 tomatoes
2 carrots
8 small kale leaves
2 c chopped cabbage
2 c sliced zucchini
2 tsp dried basil (or fresh if you have it!)
1/2 c. parmesan cheese, plus extra for garnish

Optional: potatoes, green beans, pasta, corn, green peppers, celery stalks and leaves, substitute beef broth for 2-4 c. of water

After addition of pureed beans.

• Soak the beans about 8 hrs (longer is fine) in 1 quart water. You can soak them overnight, or, if you know you're making this for dinner, put them in the water first thing in the morning, and they'll be soaked by the time you're ready to make dinner. 
• Drain water from beans once soaked, add 2 quarts of water and cook in a pot with a lid for about 1-1.5 hrs or until soft.
• When beans are done, add olive oil and butter to a large pot (do not overheat--oil should not smoke)
• Chop onions and add them to pot along with parsley and thyme
• Stir onions frequently for about 2 minutes
• Between stirring, pour beans and their liquid into a blender or food processor and process until smooth. Add to the pot.
• Chop carrots and add to pot
• Chop kale and add to pot. If you don't have kale, you can use any kind of greens. Fannie calls for Swiss chard. You could use spinach, etc, just make sure you adjust cooking times. Spinach or Swiss chard should go in after all the vegetables, since they take very little time to cook. I used kale, adding it here because it takes a while to cook.
• Chop tomatoes and add to pot
• Cover and simmer 15 minutes
• Add zucchini, cabbage and 1 quart water (or beef broth). I just used water. I had blanched my cabbage earlier this summer, so I used that. It cooled the pan down a lot, since it was still frozen, so I waited until the soup began to simmer again before starting the timer.
• Cook for 20 more minutes
• Add basil and 1/2 c. parmesan, stir and adjust seasonings. I added some oregano at this point, along with the basil, and some more salt. 
• Garnish with  more parmesan.

This looks all complicated from the long set of directions, but it's really not. It's time consuming to chop all those veggies, but it's not stressful if you don't worry about adding everything at once. I tried to add each thing in order, then go on with chopping the next thing and adding it as I went. It turned out pretty well, though I realized when it was almost done that I didn't have any parmesan. It was much better as leftovers when I added parmesan. But when I made it, I just garnished with regular grated cheese. It wasn't as good without parmesan.

Simmering in the pot.

Still, it was really good despite the fact that unlike my mom's, it doesn't have potatoes, noodles, garbanzos, or green beans. Since I don't have any of those things, it worked out well. It's the flavor that really makes it minestrone, and this one has it, at least more so than any restaurant minestrone I've had. So I'd say it's a success. I'd make it again for sure, especially if I didn't have a recipe for minestrone already. And I think next time I make it like my mom's, I'm going to change up the beans and do them as Fannie does. I really liked the thickness they added to the broth.

Borscht (Russian Beet Soup)

 It's been a while since I've posted a cabbage recipe. But I'm still drowning in cabbages. No complaints here, though. It's nice to have a success crop my first year of gardening. What I don't have is beets. But my mom grew some, so she brought me some and asked if I could make borscht. I don't think I'd ever heard of this dish before my mom said I should make it.

It took me a couple days to get to it, since I didn't have any beef broth. I ended up making it with bone broth from the ham I made last week. The recipe is pretty simple.

In a large pot, cook 4 c. beef broth

 

 Get enough beets to make 2 cups. I used 3, but only took pics of 2.

Remove stems and skins. 

Chop or shred beets.

Add 1 onion, chopped, and 1-2 c. shredded cabbage. I used purple cabbage.

Simmer in a covered pot until veggies are tender.

Add 1 tbsp. lemon juice or vinegar

Add water if necessary

Season if necessary

Serve hot or chilled, with

1/2 c. sour cream

This recipe was pretty good. The beets were very sweet and the soup had great flavor. I really enjoyed it. If you like beets and cabbage, you would like this recipe.