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Crappy week calls for comforting soup

I had plans to make something else this week, but something about the best laid plans of mice and men.

Bear with me as I get personal for just a second before getting into the recipe (I know, it’s widely mocked), but on Sunday night one of my two oldest cats had his first seizure and it was rather traumatic for us (he seems to be doing OK but it probably isn’t good news in the long run). This comes on the heels of learning less than two weeks ago that my other oldest cat has chronic health issues. So not only have I not been sleeping well but we’ve upped our medication routine lately, and of course, my anxiety.

This all means that while I had a vague idea of what I was going to make, I didn’t get around to it yet. Thankfully, my sweetie had plans to make one of his favorite seasonal soups, beer cheese soup. More importantly, he had the ingredients on hand. So, while he did some household chores, I made the soup.

Amy Thielen’s beer cheese soup recipe ingredients.

It’s from Amy Thielen’s The New Midwestern Table, one of my favorite cookbooks, and the beer cheese soup recipe in it is one of our family favorites. It’s not the healthiest but its simple and quality ingredients make it seem kinda OK.

Because I trust Amy Thielen, I mostly follow her recipes with little alteration. The same is true in this case, except as it was approaching 9 p.m., I decided to skip the blending step. I know, it’s sacrilege to have chunky beer cheese soup, but it works for me. Mostly, I don’t love smooth soups. But also, after realizing that my diced veggies — as the recipe called for — weren’t that chunky, I figured I’d save myself the effort.

After all, it’s been the kind of week that calls for easy, comfort food.

See those chunks. Yum.

Here’s what I did:

Ingredients

  • 1 stick (8 T.) butter (I used unsalted even though the recipe calls for salted)
  • 2 medium carrots, diced (dicing is less critical if you plan to puree)
  • 1 large red bell pepper, diced (dicing is less critical if you plan to puree)
  • ¾ c. all-purpose flour
  • 4 c. broth (chicken or vegetable, preferably homemade)
  • 1 (12 oz.) can/bottle of beer (the recipe calls for a pale ale, I used my staple of Hamm’s)
  • 1 ½ c. half and half
  • 12 oz. white cheddar, grated (good-ish stuff preferred)
  • ½ T. Worcestershire sauce
  • Hot sauce, to taste
  • ⅛ t. ground nutmeg
  • 2 T. Dijon mustard
  • 2 T. lemon juice
  • Salt and pepper, to taste
  • Mustard oil, for serving (optional but a delight)
  • Thyme, for serving (fresh preferable but dry also works)

Directions

In a large Dutch oven over medium heat, melt the butter. Add the carrots, peppers, and a pinch of salt, and cook until the vegetables are softened, about 5 minutes. Add the flour and cook, stirring regularly until well incorporated, about 5 minutes more.

Add the stock, beer, and half and half, and cook, stirring often, at a slow simmer over medium low heat. Cook for about 15 minutes.

Add the cheese by the handful, stirring after each addition until the mixture is smooth. Add in the Worcestershire sauce, hot sauce, nutmeg, mustard, and lemon juice, and stir to combine.

Puree the soup in batches, if desired, being careful not to get hurt by the hot soup.

Just before serving, add salt and pepper, as needed, to taste. Ladle into bowls and garnish with a small swirl of mustard oil and a sprinkle of fresh thyme, and enjoy!

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Springing into fall with super soup

I set out this week to make a soup. This is partially weather-related and mostly due to the fact that I had a head cold for about half the week and wanted my cozy hot comfort food.

The recipe that stood out most to me was a light spring soup called a brodo. But this is fall, dammit. Of course, I’m sure it’s possible still to find asparagus in the grocery store, either fresh or frozen, but it just didn’t feel right.

Brodo ingredients, sans broth. Isn’t it ironic, don’t ya think?

Also, because this soup had some cream and gnocchi, I thought it’d work as a fall dish.

So, I did some swapping and some additions, and boy, did I make a good, and pretty easy soup. The biggest difficulty was that I made my own broth. However, it’s not entirely necessary, and stupid me, I had some broth in the freezer that I realized to late. So, good reminder to make broth way ahead of time and freeze it, but yeah, try to remember it’s there when needed. Or, just buy some high-quality broth.

To fully fall this soup, I changed asparagus for Brussels sprouts and added bacon. It wasn’t even that many changes, but it sure felt perfect for autumn.

Soup is gone. So sad.

Here’s what I did, adapting from my Soup Nights cookbook (one of too many/not enough soup cookbooks I own):

Ingredients 

  • 2 T. vegetable oil
  • 1 lb. Brussels sprouts, sliced
  • 8 c. vegetable or chicken broth (store bought or pre-made)
  • ⅓ c. heavy cream
  • 4 to 5 oz. blue cheese crumbles, divided
  • 4 t. cornstarch
  • 4 t. tap water
  • 16 oz. pre-made potato gnocchi
  • Salt and pepper, to taste
  • Cayenne pepper, to taste (I like it spicy so I used closer to 1 t. but very taste dependent and a little goes a long way)
  • 1 to 1 ½ bunches green onions, sliced, to taste
  • 8 slices bacon, cooked to package directions, for serving
  • Chives, to taste, for serving

Directions

In a large Dutch oven over medium-high heat, add the oil and then the Brussels sprouts. Cook until softened and starting to brown. Add the vegetable broth and heat to boiling.

Meanwhile, mix together the blue cheese and heavy cream in a small bowl. Once the broth is boiling, add the cheese and cream mixture.

In the same bowl (or separately), mix together the corn starch and water, and then add that mixture to the soup mixture. Stir often for about 3 minutes until the soup begins to thicken.

Add the salt and pepper, cayenne, green onions, and the gnocchi, cooking another 3 to 5 minutes until the pre-made gnocchi is cooked through. Season more, as needed.

Ladle soup into bowls, serve with cooked bacon, any additional blue cheese crumbles as desired, and chives, and enjoy!

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Decadence defined

Mistakes were made in the creation of this week’s recipe, but because it all turned out to be fine in the end, I’ll parrot the great Bob Ross in saying that it was a happy little accident.

Since my sweetie was out of town for the week, I didn’t want to make any hefty meal that I’d have to eat all on my own. That’s kind of a challenge when it comes to making things in a Dutch oven.

So, I thought a safe thing to make might be bread. Sure, it’d make a lot but it’d be easier to freeze and share. Even better, I found a recipe for dinner rolls in my Cook It In Your Dutch Oven cookbook so I could make mini-sized bites.

But I didn’t need dinner rolls for light solo dinners. Breakfast rolls sounded better.

This is where things went off the rails. I started looking in another cookbook for sweet breads, decided on cinnamon rolls, saw a recipe for bacon maple bread, and then amended my plan to make bacon maple cinnamon rolls.

A quick Google search confirmed that I wasn’t the only one who’d had this idea so there was a good chance my idea wasn’t totally crazy.

I tracked down a cinnamon roll recipe I made a few years ago and then updated it to what I thought would work for my tastes. The Googled recipes also offered some hints but I wanted to do it my way.

It was a little difficult to fit in my Dutch oven, and the center did not hold as it baked, but it hardly mattered once I tasted it.

It turned out to be about the most deliciously decadent thing I’ve made. And totally inappropriate for me to eat all by myself.

Thank goodness my sweetie is back to share them tomorrow.

Bacon maple cinnamon rolls. So decadent.

Here’s how I made the happy little accidents:

Ingredients

For the dough

  • 1 c. warm milk
  • 1 stick butter
  • ½ c. sugar
  • 2 ½ t. active dry yeast (or one package)
  • 1 egg
  • 2 t. salt
  • 4-5 c. all-purpose flour

For the cinnamon center

  • 1 stick butter, softened
  • 3 t. cinnamon
  • 4 T. brown sugar
  • 4-5 T. maple syrup
  • 10 slices bacon, cooked, cooled, and chopped
  • ½ c. chopped pecans (pecan chips, if available)

For (optional) cream cheese topping

  • 4 T. butter, softened
  • 4 oz. cream cheese, softened
  • 4 T. maple syrup
  • ½ t. vanilla
  • ¾ c. powdered sugar
  • 1 t. ground cardamom (optional)
  • ½ c. pecans, for topping (optional)

Directions

In a small saucepan, melt the butter and add the milk. Heat the milk to just warm but not too hot so it doesn’t destroy the yeast. Add the sugar and yeast to the butter and milk mixture. Let activate for about 15 minutes.

Add the mixture to a large bowl and stir in the remaining dough ingredients. Add flour until a dough forms, and then knead for 5 to 10 minutes until springy and smooth, adding flour as necessary.

Shape into a round, place back in bowl and cover. Let rise for about 2 hours. (I opted to do this over two week nights, so I refrigerated the dough after this rise, and then let warm back up for about an hour after getting home the next night; also possible to do once its in roll form in the Dutch oven.)

Meanwhile, mix together the cinnamon center ingredients. In a small bowl, stir together butter, cinnamon, brown sugar, and maple syrup. Prepare the bacon and pecans, if not already ready. Prepare the Dutch oven by making a foil sling by folding in half to long sheets of aluminum foil, so you have 2 long, roughly 7 inch sheets. Place sheets perpendicular to each other, like a lowercase t, and carefully smooth down into the bowl. Spray with a little bit of oil.

When the dough is ready, roll out into about an 18 inch by 9 inch rectangle on a lightly floured surface. Spread with the cinnamon mixture, and then place the bacon pieces and pecan pieces on top.

Roll the coated dough along the long end into a log. Cut into about 14 even pieces. Turn and place the pieces in the Dutch oven, starting with the outside adding about 9 to 10 pieces along the edges and then placing the remaining rolls in the center.

Cover and let rise for about an hour to an hour and a half. Meanwhile, heat the oven to 350 degrees. Once dough has risen, uncover and place the rolls in the oven, and bake for about 20 to 30 minutes until golden on top.

Meanwhile, mix together the ingredients of the cream cheese topping, if using. Let rolls cool for at least 5 minutes but while still warm, add the frosting, and then cool a little longer before enjoying!

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Lazy, lovely layered lasagna

I was scrolling through Twitter one fine day keeping up on the shitshow that is our current American political system when I was distracted by something not actually terrible, an Epicurious video.

The short clip I watched without sound was a recipe for slow-cooker lasagna. I thought it sounded amazing, except, you know, I wanted to make it in my Dutch oven.

Lasagna ingredients.

Now, I’ve made lasagna a lot and I have a couple of favorites, so instead of watching the video again, I just sort of guessed/remembered/assumed what I should do to put together my own dish.

Except for the fact that I did a terrible job of evenly distributing my filling, the lasagna was amazing. I mean, most times I make lasagna, there’s too many noodles to fit but this time, oof, I really distributed poorly for the layers. But all was not lost. I just made sure to take from the better filled areas and the less filled areas and made it work.

However, if you, dear reader, try the same, be sure to go light on the filling as you roll up the noodles.

Now, having made lasagna a few different ways during my time, starting with the traditional-ish, I have to say my favorite is still actually the sheet pan recipe because I like my lasagna crispy. But if you really like the saucy bits, this one is for you. And either way, good lasagna is good lasagna, so this was quite good.

BRB, there’s more in the fridge.

Here’s what I did:

Ingredients

  • 1 box lasagna noodles, cooked to package directions
  • 32 oz. jar of arrabbiata sauce, or red pasta sauce to your liking
  • 1 (15 oz.) tub ricotta
  • 3 c. mozzarella, shredded, divided
  • 1 c. Parmesan cheese, shredded, divided
  • 4 oz. feta, crumbled
  • 1 egg
  • 1 (10 oz.) box frozen chopped spinach, thawed
  • 10 oz. marinated artichokes, chopped
  • ½ T. basil, chopped
  • ½ T. dried oregano
  • ½ T. dried rosemary
  • 1 t. red pepper flakes, optional
  • Pepper, to taste

Directions

Heat the oven to 325 degrees.

In a large bowl, mix together the ricotta, 1 c. mozzarella, ⅓ c. Parmesan, egg, spinach, artichokes, and the herbs and spices, until well mixed. EVENLY spread the mixture onto about 14 lasagna noodles, more if necessary, and roll the noodles lengthwise.

Poor about ¼ of the sauce onto the bottom of a Dutch oven. Add about half the rolled noodles to the Dutch oven; sprinkle with 1 c. mozzarella, ⅓ c. Parmesan, and half the feta, and about half the remaining sauce. Place the remainder of the rolled noodles on top, and then top with the remaining sauce, and cheeses.

Cover the Dutch oven and bake for about 30 minutes; then, remove from heat and remove the lid. Bake another about 20 to 30 minutes, uncovered, until the cheese is browned on top. Let cool slightly, and enjoy!