Rich Food for Broke Folks: Turnip and Bok Choy Soup

It's soup weather! Funny thing about soup; I'm never that excited about it until I taste it, and then I remember, each time, how wonderful it is. This soup, for me, is just the right balance between light and rich, plus it uses turnips, which are a vegetable like that awkward item on your desk or in your kitchen. You keep trying to find a place for them, but somehow they keep turning up (GEDDIT) in the middle of the work you're trying to do. This is a place for turnips. They absorb just enough of the broth that they become tender (you won't cook them till they're mushy) and they are a great amplifier of the broth's meatiness.

Look, I know broth is turning into the new juice. Just the other day I passed a broth bar in the East Village. Thanks, Paleo people. Ignore them. No matter how much swanky places try to charge you for it, remember: broth is cheap and easy to make. It's what you make out of the ends and scraps of things in your kitchen. Today you're getting a two-for-one post, since I'm telling you how to make the beef bone broth as well as the turnip and bok choy soup. Feel free to make the soup with whatever broth you have on hand! And if you don't have broth on hand, well, you know what to do.

Recipe is adapted from Not Eating Out in NY. 

BROTH

Ingredients

Beef soup bones - 1 large, or several small.

2-3 carrots

2-3 celery bits (I use the pale hearts of the bunch, as well as the leafy tops)

2-3 green tops of leeks

knob of ginger

2 tbsp cider vinegar

dash of soy sauce

Enough water to fill up the stock pot.

Directions

Boil all those things together. Bring it up to a boil, and then turn it down to a simmer, and leave it overnight, if you can. Strain the bones and vegetables out - don't feel bad about this, you will have boiled every last micron of flavor out of them - and divide and freeze the broth. I like to put it in ziploc bags holding 1-3 cups.

But save about 3 cups worth of the broth. Time to make:

SOUP

Ingredients

2 large turnips

3-4 large leaves bok choy

2-3 thin slices of ginger

salt and pepper

3 cups broth

additional water as needed

Directions

Clean and chop the turnips into largish chunks - the size of the chunk of meat you'd want to find in your soup. Heat up the broth and throw in the turnips and ginger slices. Cook for about 5 minutes on a low boil, or until the turnips start to get tender when poked with a fork. Chop the bok choy roughly and add it to the pot; add additional water to get the density of soup you like. Cook for another five minutes. The vegetables should all be tender, but not mushy.

Don't tell the rich people about this soup. We've got to keep some nice things for ourselves.

Roasted Tomato, Red Pepper, and Chard Soup

I am very proud of this soup. Less so of my photos.

I have a chard problem. I considered it the archetype of disgusting vegetation as a child, and despite my later conversion to the Church of the Bitter Greens, I still find myself occasionally at a loss for what to do with it. When it's young, I just pop it into the salad along with everything else, but when it's older, it commands the attention and should probably be cooked. Mostly I saute it with sausages, but that takes meat, and I don't have enough meat to keep up with the sheer volume of chard that my garden is producing.

Hence, this soup. This soup will change your life. (Perhaps not as thoroughly as the Life-Changing Cabbage Soup, but I still give it a 73% chance of life-changing). It's incredible: the sweetness of the grilled peppers, the startling savoriness of the grilled tomatoes, are given this beautiful, flavorful depth by the bitterness of the chard. I'm eating a bowl of it right now.

The first time I made this soup, it was entirely with garden produce. The peppers are ending now, so I had to supplement them with store-bought ones, but it's a great end-of-summer dish, especially since the grilling adds extra flavor. It's good cold or hot, and like most soups, is even better the next day. 

Ingredients:

• 1 bunch chard
• 2-3 red peppers
• A lot of tomatoes (look, how much will depend on what size your tomatoes are - let's say enough tomatoes to give you about 3 cups worth?)
• One onion
• Handful of basil
• 1 quart chicken stock

Directions

Rinse your tomatoes and peppers and grill them on high heat. The peppers will turn black. Don't worry, that's exactly what's supposed to happen. Turn them so they're blackened on all sidesSome of the tomatoes will burst their skins. If that happens, go ahead and scoop it up - grill it any further and it might disintegrate. 

They should look about like this

Gather up your grilled vegetables and let them cool on a baking sheet. You'll want to use all the delicious juices they're giving off, so be sure to use something with sides.

Chop your onion and put it in a soup pot. Saute it in olive oil until it starts to soften. 

Wash your chard well, chop it finely, and add it to the onion. Saute it until the stems are soft and the greens are limp.

Finely chopped chard

Once your grilled tomatoes and peppers are cool, slip their skins off. This is most important - and easiest - for the peppers. If the tomato skins aren't already falling off, don't worry about them. But do take off the skins, the stems, and the seeds, from the red peppers. 

Put all your grilled vegetables into the soup pot. Rinse the juices from the pan into the soup pot. Add a quart of chicken stock. Or whatever stock you've got on hand. You do have stock on hand, right? I mean, you can get by without it, but your next project should really be stocking up on stock.

Simmer simmer simmer simmer.

Add caption

Once everything is looking well simmered (20 mins - 1 hour, soup is flexible) pull it off the stove and let it cool.

Once it is cool enough not to break your blender, pour it in the blender and puree it.

That's it! Enjoy!

Double-Cooking: Two Things With Chicken and Sweet Potatoes

Stocking up on chicken-and-sweet-potato dishes

So there's this technique, apparently, whereby you can knit two socks at once? I don't know, I've never tried. I mean, I do knit (of course) but I haven't advanced to that level. Anyway, I'm not talking about knitting. I'm talking about food. This knitting technique I don't know how to do was supposed to be a metaphor for a cooking technique that I am all about: cooking two different dishes at once.

This works best when there's a significant degree of overlap between the dishes. My preferred Saturday night stock-up strategy, actually, is to pull everything that needs to be cooked out of the fridge and stare at it for a while, figuring out what I might be able to do with it, and then make a couple of dishes with various permutations of the stuff. In this case, I was over at my grandparents' house, helping them stock up, and so I'm proud to bring you this week an actual recipe from an actual grandma: Apple Cider Chicken Soup with Sweet Potatoes. The second recipe is Sweet Potato Chicken Pie, which is a recipe from my mother.

Ingredients (listed separately for each one, a star indicates overlap)

Apple Cider Chicken Soup with Sweet Potatoes
2 cups cider or apple juice
*2 quarts stock
*pinch of thyme
pinch of basil
pinch of savory if you've got it
2 firm apples
*2 large sweet potatoes
*1 large onion
*2 large celery stalks
*3 large carrots
*bag of frozen peas
*Chicken bits (see instructions for commentary on various ways to achieve bits-of-chicken)

Sweet Potato Chicken Pie
*1 large onion
*2 large celery stalks
*2 cups stock
1/4 cup flour
*2 sweet potatoes
*4 regular potatoes (apparently they were called Irish potatoes when my grandmother was growing up)
*3 large carrots
*bag of frozen peas
head of broccoli/small bag of frozen broccoli
*chicken bits
*pinch of thyme
pinch of sage

Instructions 
(This is for the two-at-once method. You will just have to disentangle them if you want to make one at a time.)

First, figure out how you're handling the chicken. If this were my own kitchen, here's how I'd do it: buy a whole chicken and boil it (this seems like as good a method as any), pick the meat off and reserve it for the two dishes, and then boil the bones even longer for some good stock. This would take a while, however, so in this case my grandfolks bought a couple of rotisserie chickens from the grocery store and used pre-made stock. So work with what you've got, and set your own priorities as to cost and speed!

Get yourself two nice big pots. In the biggest one, start heating the stock and the cider (or apple juice, which is what I used here. Check out that can of apple juice concentrate! Does't that take you back? What, you didn't grow up with cans of juice concentrate? Whatever.)

Get yourself one large square baking dish or two medium baking dishes for the pie. Set them out so they'll be ready.

Chop up the onions and the celery. Pour a nice dollop of oil into the other pot, and start sauteeing the onions and celery. Once they're lightly browned, pour half of the onion-celery mixture into the heating stock in the big pot. Add a little more oil and saute the remaining mixture for a bit longer.

Gravy for the pie

Add the flour to the sauteeing onion-celery mixture. Brown it lightly, then add stock until you have a medium-thick gravy-like liquid. You'll use this in your pie. Take it off the heat.

Chop the carrots. Add half to the soup pot, distribute the other half in the pie dish(es). If you like your carrots very soft, you can steam them before adding them to the pie.

Open the bag of peas. If it's a large bag, add half to the soup pot, distribute the other half in the pie dish.

Any other vegetables you're adding to either dish, throw them in here. In my case, broccoli for the pie.

And the soup's just chilling - well, warming - on the stove

Peel and chop the apples into appetizing chunks. Add them to the soup pot.

Peel and dice the sweet potatoes. Add half to the soup pot. Set the other half aside.

Dice the regular potatoes. Add half to the pie dish. Set the other half aside with the remaining sweet potatoes.

Pour out the gravy over the pie vegetables, thinning as needed.

Put some more water in the gravy pot, enough to cover the remaining sweet potatoes and regular potatoes. Boil them until they can be be mashed.

This gravy definitely needed to be thinned

While the potatoes are boiling, dismember and distribute the chicken. One medium-sized chicken will provide enough meat for both dishes. Two small chickens (which is what we used) will provide quite a lot of meat for both dishes. Tear or cut the meat up into small bits, such as are suitable for soup and pie. Sprinkle the seasonings into the soup and onto the pie. Add salt and pepper. Mix up the contents of the pie dish nicely, so you'll get a bit of everything in every piece.

The potatoes should be done about now. You can use the water from boiling the potatoes to thin the gravy in the pie if necessary. Leave a little water in the pot, and you can mash the potatoes right in the pot itself.

Getting ready for pie topping

Spread the mashed potatoes over the top of the pie. As you can see, I didn't make quite enough - you should have a thick fluffy layer, and I have a thin threadbare layer. The great thing is, it still tastes just fine.

Bake the pies in a 350 oven for an hour or so.

Freeze the soup. There's no way you'll be eating it all right then. You can freeze the pie, too, if you like.

Cost:
Carrots: $2
Celery: $2
Onions: $1
Sweet potatoes: $3
Regular potatoes: $1.50
Juice/Cider: $1.50
Apples: $1
Peas: $2
Broccoli: $2
Chicken: $8
Total: $24

Serves: Pies serve about 8-10 people, soup serves 10-12, or the whole thing can be frozen and feed two people for half a month.

The final pie. You can turn the broiler on if you like the top crispy.

Fish Head Salmon Chowder

I'm still not sure what kind of grandma I want to be. The sweet, jolly, hand-holding kind, filling the kids with sweets and stories, or the stern, crotchety no-nonsense kind, who will tell you exactly what's what? Well, I suppose that's why I've got so many years ahead of me to practice. Today, I'm feeling like the latter, and today, what's on the menu is fish head chowder.

In the evening, floating in the soup!

Yeah, I could have called it "salmon chowder", and just happened to mention in passing that oh yeah, you can use a fish head if you want, but no. You came here to learn how to cook real, nutritious, tasty food at a price you can afford, and in order to do that, you're going to use a fish head. Don't give me any of that whining about "ooh, it has eyes". So do fillets, it's just someone else has been to the trouble of chopping them off for you (and you've paid them for that privilege). If you can't handle where your food comes from, you've got no business eating it.




Besides, the head is full of delicious fat, which is where both the flavor and the nutrients are in a wild-caught salmon (which you can buy since you are buying the least expensive cut and which is a fish you really shouldn't bother buying farmed). One head will give you meat for one pot of soup and bones for a good gallon of stock. Go head or go home.

Fish Head Salmon Chowder

Ingredients: 
1 large fish head
about 4 medium potatoes, chopped into medium chunks
1 large onion, large dice
*1 bunch scallions
*1 large turnip, medium chunks
*2 cups frozen peas
*2 large carrots, medium chunks
*thyme
*yogurt
*salt and pepper


*optional - replace with something similar or leave out, like you do with soup.

Instructions:
Chop your onions, potatoes, turnip and carrot, if using. Wash your fish head.

Saute the onions in a bit of oil until they are just starting to turn golden. Then add the potatoes, and turnip. If your fish head is frozen (mine was), add it here. If not, just add enough water to cover everything and let it boil lightly for five minutes or so.

Try and get the head out whole;'
the bones get EVERYWHERE otherwise

Add the head (if not frozen) and your color-vegetables - peas and carrots are always reliable. I bet this soup would be decent with cauliflower or broccoli, or even celery. Simmer about 20 minutes.

Delicately - you see from the picture how it's coming apart? - remove the head and place it in a large bowl. Have a second bowl - or, save time, a stock-pot - on hand for the bones. Run some cold water over it to cool it down. Wash your hands well - you're going to be getting very close and personal with the head.

Oh yea, sorry about the zested lime.
I'm making tom yum on the other burner.

You'll see right off where the meat is on the neck. Just ease that right off and pop it back into the soup. Then carefully start to disassemble the head. There are little deposits of meat on the cheeks - they'll be lighter in color than the body meat - and along the nose. And  look at that delicious skin! Who would pay good money for fish oil pills when you have the real thing right here?

This should be basically the only solid bit left of the head.
Some people like the eyeballs, but I'm not a fan. 

Since I'm making this soup for other people, though, I will reluctantly save the skin, with the rest of the bones, for making more stock. The bones are full of collagen - a connective tissue protein that will give the stock a thick, creamy texture. It's the stuff you make gelatin out of.

Put the water and the fish head meat back into the soup pot, and put your bones and bits on the back burner for stock. Add spices (I used thyme and scallions; dill is also good), salt and pepper and let the soup simmer a little bit longer, until the potatoes are tender. Don't simmer till the peas turn brown.

Stock options! Ah ha ha ha!

You now have a couple of options for this soup. You can eat it just as it is, and if you simmered that head properly, it should be plenty thick and creamy. If you want to add some dairy in there, as is common for chowders, try stirring in about half a cup of yogurt. (Incidentally, use yogurt just about every time a soup recipe tells you to use cream. It's cheaper, tastier, and just as effective, unless you use the fat-free stuff.)






Look at that beautiful soup! Eat it up, yum.

Can't get enough fish heads? SeriousEats has a great recipe (and a great series, The Nasty Bits, which should be required reading if you want to keep eating meat while keeping your costs under control).







Price:
Salmon Head: $1.50
Potatoes: ~$1
Onion: $.25
Turnip $.75
Scallions: $.50
Carrots $.50
Frozen peas: $.50
TOTAL: $5
SERVES: 6-8 people.

Potato Leek Soup

As the winter sinks its claws into the east coast again, don't you want warm soup? I want warm soup. This is my go to soup. It's easy, it's cheap, its warm and delicious.

When I make potato leek soup, the creamy-pureed soup, that is not at the top of my list. Cream soups make giant messes of pots, and I like generally like chunks in my soup. I think of it as easy vegetable soup, really. Get tasty potatoes, russets or yukon gold. If you have one available, and have the fortitude to deal with one, a grated celery root is a delicious addition, as are celery seeds, but if neither are on hand, it is good without.

Potato Leek Soup

serves: lots

4 tbsp butter (or less, or olive oil)

minced ginger to taste

salt to taste

1 bay leaf

3 quarts broth, approximately*

3 leeks, with the ends trimmed

4 carrots, peeled and chopped

4 stalks of celery, chopped

4 potatoes, chopped

Melt the butter and sautee the garlic.

When the butter is melted and the garlic looks sauteed, add in the broth, bay leaf, and all the vegetables except the potatoes. Boil until everything is pretty soft, for about half an hour. Pull out the bay leaf and blend. If you have an immersion blender, now is a great time to use it; if not, you'll have to blend it in a regular mixer; try to get mostly the solid pieces in the blender, you'll be less likely to burn yourself that way. You don't really need to puree it to smooth unless you want to, like I said, I like some chunks. Cook it with the potatoes, until they are soft to the touch and nice and biteable, about another half hour.

Serve it with good crusty bread if you have it.

Unlike Bess, I am absolutely terrible at actually keeping track of how much anything costs. I might get better later as the blog progresses, but for now...here is my recipe.

*I use Trader Joe's vegetable broth that comes in a box. I would highly recommend using broth instead of water, but what kind of broth you use is really up to you.

Life-Changing Cabbage Soup

Slightly tangy, slightly creamy, this cabbage soup will make you rethink cabbage.

I know, this is a lot to promise from any soup, particularly from a soup made from the notoriously sock-flavored boiled cabbage. But this soup has made believers out of all my housemates. It’s at once tender and hearty, it sticks to your ribs and warms you right through, and it’s just as good if not better the next day.

Adapted from Nash Holos.

Ingredients:

1 head of cabbage

2-4 potatoes (more if small)

2 onions

1 leek (or on this case, a ton of scallions)

2 tbsp butter or oil
2 tbsp flour

1-2 cups yogurt.

2 liters water or stock

Start heating the water or stock in a large soup pot.

Chop the potatoes up pretty small. You’ll be mashing them up in the soup, and a lot of the texture is going to come from how thoroughly you mash them. Personally, I like a few of them to stay chunky, but it’s up to you. So is the type of potato - I just use whatever is on hand, and so far everything’s worked.

Slice the cabbage up pretty small - not grated-level fine, but you don’t want to be fishing out recognizable chunks of cabbage. Drop it in the stock and let simmer. I use green cabbage, but there’s no reason red shouldn’t work, other than it might look odd.

Chop up the onion. The size will depend on how you like your onions in soup. Larger chunks if you like the succulent burst of savory onion flavor and smooth simmered texture, small dice if you’re not so into that and want the onion to blend more into the background. Add it to the soup. Let the whole thing just boil lightly for a while until the potatoes are mashable. In the meantime…

Chop the second onion and the leek - same deal about size depending on how you like them. Heat the butter or oil in a small skillet and start caramelizing the onion and leek. This’ll take about ten minutes or so; don’t skimp on the time here because this is what will give you a rich savory flavor in the soup.

While your onions are caramelizing, mash the potatoes in the soup pot. I just use the back of a spoon. Add water if it's thicker than you'd like.

Add a little more butter or oil to the skillet and then add the flour. I’ve used whole wheat flour and ground oat flour - I like something a little robust. Stir that around with the onions until it starts to smell like toast, 2-3 minutes. Then put the whole thing in the soup pot and stir it around.

Deglaze the onion skillet with the yogurt, and pour it into the soup. Turn down the heat so the yogurt doesn’t separate, stir it well, add salt, pepper, and a dash of lemon juice if you like, and eat.

Serves between four and eight, depending on how hungry they are and how much leftovers they want.

Cost breakdown:
Cabbage: $0.79
Onions: $0.23
Potatoes ~$.50? (part of CSA)
Scallions: $1.00
Yogurt: $1.00
Stock ~$1.00? (made from a $7.00 chicken)

TOTAL: $4.52