butternut harvest soup

ummm, hi. hello. sorry i'm late. do you know i've posted 11 times in 2010? yup, blogger FAIL. my bad.

it's not that i haven't cooked... well, i didn't more or less all summer because my darling husband can (and WILL) grill an. y. thing. (nom.) when we moved, we got a new grill to go with our new patio-- a full-height camping grill. beats the one that sits six inches off the ground. and it gets a full-sized propane tank. HOORAY. he also got a cuisinart griddler for our anniversary. so much grilling.

um, yeah, anyway.

lately i don't want to blog without pictures, i guess, so i just don't blog. but while my parents were in paris, france, europe the past couple weeks, we got their csa and i've been cooking some interesting stuff. like butternut harvest soup.

ingredients:

• 1 butternut squash, peeled, gutted and cubed
• 1 granny smith apple, peeled, cored and cubed
• 2-3 carrots, peeled and chopped
  
• 2 leeks (white and light parts only) cleaned and chopped
• 2 tbs butter
• 6ish cups chicken broth
• salt, pepper, nutmeg
  
• greek yogurt

prep:

• peel, gut, core, chop, cube

actual cooking:

• saute leeks and carrots in butter until tender
• add broth and bring to a boil
• add apple & squash and simmer until squash is easily pierced with a fork
• remove from heat and blend in a food processor or with an immersion blender
  
• season with salt, pepper and a pinch of nutmeg if you like
• stir a heaping tablespoon of greek yogurt into each bowl
  

so, this was the first of 4 soups i made over the course of two weeks. i also have a massive fail (with pictures) to blog and a pretty awesome seat-of-my-pants dinner. i will try very hard to blog them.

recession challenge: dinner for two all week from one pound of sausage

this week's dinners are: flatbread pizza with sausage, onion & brussels sprouts, sausage sandwiches with provolone & wilted spinach, macaronis with sausage & cheese served with sauteed zucchini & creamy tomato florentine soup with sausage.

ingredients:

• 1 pound sausage (cheating. my dad makes it, so i have no clue how much a pound of sausage costs. sorry.)
• 2 1/2 cups flour (pantry staple)
• 2 tbs psyllium husk* (negligible, but a canister of psyllium ran me ~$5)
• water
• provolone cheese (i'm not sure how much by weight cost us ~$4, but only about 5 slices will be used for dinners, so maybe $2 worth?)
• tomato gravy/pizza sauce (~$1)
• brussels sprouts (i paid $2.30)
• onion (i don't know, $0.50?)
• 4 slices good bread (we buy this anyway for bill's lunches, but maybe a third of a loaf will be used for dinners, so ~$1?)
• baby spinach ($2)
• 1/2 pound short, curly pasta like shells (~$0.50)
• scratch cheese (pantry staple)
• zucchini (i paid $2.30)
• veggie broth ($2)
• mirepoix ($3, but i'm using the some left from last week's soup)
• canned whole tomatoes ($2, but also leftover from last week's soup)
• butter (pantry staple)
• 1/2 pound ditalini ($0.50, also leftover from last week's soup)

i'm using more and more pantry staples, so the things i actually had to buy this week ran about $15. of course, i didn't buy sausage, so that could add, what, $5? $8? i really don't know.

*about psyllium. ummm, it's a milled seed thing... that turns into this gelatinous mass with water... it's the main ingredient in most fiber supplements... and also an egg replaces/stabilizer thing. i THINK that you could sub 2 eggs in the flatbread recipe, and obviously use less (or maybe no?) water. but no promises. yet.

prep:

• put 1/2 pound sausage in the freezer for 30 minutes
• remove it and slice it into thin rounds, remove the casing if you're weird like us
• chop mirepoix if you need to

actual cooking (meal 1):

• preheat oven to 400*
• combine 2 cups flour, psyllium, salt & fresh or dried herbs to taste & 1.5 cups water
• allow to sit for about 5 minutes
• with damp or greased fingers, press out the dough on a lightly greased baking sheet to desired thickness
• bake for about 20 minutes (see? easiest pizza crust ever.)
• while shell bakes, quickly cook sliced sausage on an ungreased frying pan (use only half for the pizza! refrigerate the other half), chop some onion, slice brussels sprouts & shred 3 or four slices of provolone
• top pizza shell with pizza sauce (or leave it white if tomato gravy isn't a staple in your pantry), cheese, sausage, onions & brussels sprouts (eta: i used wilted spinach. brussels sprouts are going in the pasta.)
• bake until cheese melts and bubbles lightly

actual cooking (meal 2):

• preheat oven to 300*
• quickly saute some (up to half) of the baby spinach in olive oil until just wilted (it will shrink when you cook it!)
• on 2 slices of bread, layer cold sausage slices, wilted spinach & a slice of provolone (eta: i added a bit of thinly sliced onion on mine. fab)
• toast all 4 slices
• make sandwiches.
• (eta: i also made some fries: cut 1 potato per person into 1/2 inch sticks, arrange on an oil-spritzed baking sheet, spritz with oil, season with salt, pepper & garlic powder, bake 20-25 minutes at 400*. and yes, i'm going to wait until AFTER i cook the meals to post them from now on.)

actual cooking (meal 3):

• boil water for pasta
• roast brussels sprouts, sliced or chopped as you prefer, with olive oil
• in a medium frying pan, out of it's casing, saute the rest of the sausage
• set half aside to drain
• add cooked pasta & brussels sprouts to the other half and remove from heat
• liberally add scratch cheese

actual cooking (meal 4):

• do the regular mirepoix thing, i don't have to spell it all out anymore, do i?
• add broth
• add drained sausage, spinach, ditalini & tomatoes with their juices (chopped up)
• while ditalini is cooking, make a roux (melt 4 tbs butter in a saucepan, quickly whisk in 1/2 cup flour and 1/2 cup milk)
• add roux to soup once the ditalini is cooked
• top with scratch cheese

the soup might need to be altered... check back in about 5 days once i've made it.

squash'd tomato flor-n-bean

this soup is one of the varieties i call "veggie sludge." it's thick, flavorful and easy to make. generic veggie sludge is really easy to make, but if i don't feel like thinking about what veggies to use, i go with this insanely simple one.

ingredients:

• 2-3 yellow squashes/zucchinis
• 1 can of tomato paste
• frozen spinach
• 1 can of white kidney beans
• mirepoix (chopped celery, carrots and onions, which i buy prepared from trader joe's because i'm lazy and it's good)
• veggie broth (a quart? or chicken, i guess, or ham would probably be tasty)
• olive oil

prep:

• chop your squash into, eh, chunk-sized chunks
• rinse the beans

actual cooking:

• coat the bottom of your (not huge) pot with olive oil
• add mirepoix and stir
• give that a minute
• add broth
• add spinach, beans, tomato paste and squash
• simmer for 45 minute to an hour, depending on how sludgy you want it (i want to be able to eat it with a fork, so 45 minutes mostly covered and 15-20 uncovered to boil off the extra water)
• salt & pepper to taste

this soup is delicious alone, over chicken, as a pasta sauce, with some grated cheese, with some melted cheese, hot, cold, whatever. it's good.