Those Hearty Winter Warmers: Spicy Parsnip & Sweet Potato Soup

It appears I've been riding the root vegetable soup train this fall. The last several weeks of the CSA (which ended last Tuesday; in the words of Julia Child: "Woe!") provided us an abundance of winter squashes and storable root veggies to last at least till Thanksgiving. Parsnips! Potatoes! Turnips! I've also been making happy use of one of the (two) local whole food shops and its abundance of bulk spices, and recently stocked up on coriander (a recent flavor addiction), so when this recipe popped up on my Google browser (scroll all the way down to the soup listed at the bottom), together with feeling under-the-weather this weekend and needing a comfort food . . . I had to make it. Here's the recipe, altered a bit to satisfy the culinary needs of an inherited Southwestern palate (and the food options available at our market: sweet potatoes substituted for carrot).

Spicy Parsnip & Sweet Potato Soup
Yields 3 quarts

Ingredients
1 1/2 lb. sweet potatoes, diced
1 lb. parsnips, chopped
1 lb. potatoes, diced
1/2 lb. + turnips, diced
6 + garlic cloves, peeled & minced
6 cups chicken stock
2 bay leaves
2 T+ coriander, ground
Cayenne pepper, ground
Chili powder
Red pepper flakes
Lime juice
2 T+ olive oil
salt & pepper

Optional Toppings
Grated Parmesan
Fresh cilantro
Thinly-sliced radish

Directions 
(In large part, follow those of the La Tartine Gourmande web site. The most significant adjustments are at steps four and five.)


1. In a large (4 quart+) pot, heat two tablespoons olive oil on medium heat. Add the garlic and coriander. Cook about 1 minute, until fragrant but without browning.

2. Add the rest of the vegetables, cover, and cook for 3-5 minutes.

3. Add the stock and bay leaves. Cover and let simmer at least 20 minutes, until the vegetables are soft.

4. Discard the bay leaves and puree only half the soup, to achieve a thick consistency with some remaining whole vegetable pieces. (You - or at least I - want to taste those peppery parsnips and radishes!)

5. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Add two dashes cayenne; two dashes chili powder; two hearty pinches red pepper flakes; 2 Tablespoons+ lime juice. Serve with the optional toppings.

Pumpkin Risotto

Go ahead and make this one. You won't regret it. (I didn't. I also didn't regret eating it again for lunch today.)

My interpretations on measurements:
1 16 oz. bag orzo
2 cups pumpkin and squash puree
* note: I used home-made puree, so it went in with a mild flavor. If using canned pumpkin, you may want to go a good bit lighter than two cups.
1 stick unsalted butter
a very, very, very generous cup shredded parmesan . . . plus some

My adjustments:
Used a red onion, and added a diced red pepper (a Carmen Sweet, to be precise) to the onion saute.

Try it! You'll like it.

Party Menu

A happy November to you! That most fantastic of months. (Everyone probably thinks that way about their birthday month, eh?)

Day after October 31st, morning after evening of fall festivity at our home. Ten hours of sleep after an afternoon (five and a half hours, estimate - be very impressed) of baking baking baking cooking baking.

I was so pleased with how everything (well, all but one thing) turned out, I thought I'd share the menu - and recipes - with you. Fortunately (and rather unusually), every recipe came from the web, so I link them here for you, with a little bit of commentary about what I did (or didn't do) differently. In order of advent-in-my-kitchen:

Chewy Molasses Spice Cookies
This was their third go-round in my kitchen, and their third share with other people, to happy response. If you recall my last winter's goal of finding the perfect ginger molasses cookie, akin to my favorites from local bakeries, it has been found. This is it. And please note: there is no ginger in it. That's right. My most perfect and ideal ginger cookie has no ginger.
What I did differently: Absolutely nothing.

Apple and Carrot Shortbread
These are the "but one thing" mentioned above. Shortbread is my favorite cookie to make (So quick! So easy! So satisfying!) . . . so many extras that can be added to the mix to make them distinctive (lavender, earl gray tea, rosemary). Surely you all know by now that my favorite shortbread addition is rosemary. Since I make these so often (I used to call them my Sunday Cookies, which will indicate to you just how often I did make them for awhile, and I have a rosemary bush growing in my backyard, mostly for the baking of these cookies),  I'm pretty familiar with what goes in a good shortbread cookie. Butter. Butter, butter. And some more butter. I should have been alerted at the smaller-than-usual amount of butter in this recipe, but the idea of carrot and apple - especially for a fall party - charmed me. The carrot and apple did lend a nice, sweet flavor, but next time I'll just go ahead and use my own shortbread base with them, and play around with the moistness issues that will arise from the added apple. But that playing around will not involve reducing the butter at all.
What I did differently: Well, you know what I would do differently, but what I did do differently was

• use unbleached all-purpose flour in place of both types of flour listed in-recipe
• use regular cooking salt (hey, it's good enough for my rosemary shortbreads)
• use Trader Joe's Organic Evaporated Cane Juice (my latest favorite for baking) in place of the sugar listed in-recipe
• leave out the zest of one lemon called for, as I had no lemon

What you should know: These cookies made significantly fewer than the three dozen indicated. Perhaps two dozen.

Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes with Maple Cream Cheese Frosting

That's right. Fantastic new make of the evening (at least till we get to the next item). I can count on three fingers the number of times I've made cupcakes - I'm just not a big cake fan. And never had a go at pumpkin cupcakes . . . probably because I really dislike the flavor of canned pumpkin. Can't stand to eat the tradition Thanksgiving pumpkin pie. That icky, over-sweet, strangely-textured, clearly from-a-can flavor! (Same response to the pumpkin soup I made and tried to eat fall a year ago.) Ew. So for these, I'll just say that they were amazing (really, really good), and I will jump directly to what I did differently, which is why I think I loved them so particularly. (Though I've never yet been disappointed by a sassy radish recipe, so if you were to follow her instructions to a fully-canned precision, and if you don't hate canned pumpkin as do I, I think you'd be pleased, anyway.

What I did differently: 

• I used freshly-pureed pumpkin, a la these instructions. Also, I used one small pumpkin and one small, sweeter winter squash, which reduced the strong pumpkin flavor a bit (not entirely; just a bit), and added a nice, natural sweetness. And the pureeing wasn't difficult at all; the oven did the roasting, I scooped and food-processed, and that was that. I didn't have to add any water, though the instructions indicate you might - perhaps depending on the type of pumpkin or squash. I had quite a bit leftover, and to the freezer it went, for further pumpkin-puree additions to upcoming recipes. You should consider this as an alternative to buying the canned stuff: it is likely cheaper (two squash that probably would have equalled a dollar or dollar-fifty at this time of year produced four-ish cups of the stuff) and far healthier (no added sugar, no preservatives, nuthin' but the punkin).
• I made them small, using the cute little 24-a-sheet muffin tray. In the end, there were forty-eight cupcakes, with batter left over for - I'd say - four more big ones (stored in the freezer). P.S. I'm learning that people at a party - women, in particular, will eat at least several - if not more - teeny cupcakes when they wouldn't think of touching a full-sized cupcake. Something about the cues a full-sized cupcake gives: I'm loaded with fat! And sugar! I should actually be at a five-year-old's birthday party! I was probably bought at the grocery store bakery! But small cuteness trumps all. This is my new cupcake trick.
• I seriously adjusted the frosting according to what I had on-hand: one package cream cheese, 1/4 cup powdered sugar (same as called for on butter and maple syrup; we all know I'll never skimp on those). The result was: less icing (which was okay, as the cakes were teeny and as I didn't feel the need to slather them. Just a dollop did fine.) and cream-cheesier icing (which, in my opinion, was just fine).

Chunky Fire-Roasted Chili

What is that rule about not serving guests food you've never made before? I've never been one to follow such a rule, with oft-mixed results. Fortunately, this was one of the better ones. Lots of folks (especially the men) responded that they liked this chili, and I enjoyed it myself. I'm not sure what makes a great chili, but this one definitely falls in the category of "very good," and is rather simple to put together, excepting a little bit of vegetable chopping in the beginning and needing to have a few of the appropriate spices on hand. P.S. Know that this recipe yields, oh, 6 to 7 quarts of soup. Not knowing, I doubled the amount of ingredients on my last grocery trip, and now have enough cans of tomatoes and beans, etc. to make yet another eight-quart pot of chili. Not a bad problem this time of year.
What I did differently:

• I used only two pounds ground beef. Still a meaty stew.
• I left out the cocoa chili powder, and my paprika wasn't smoked. I'll never know what I missed, but it did taste fine as it was.
• I added two cans of black beans, as I'm a big black bean fan. Good addition.

What I would do differently next time: Leave off the cayenne. I'd give it a different kind of heat, perhaps with spicier chili powder or red pepper flakes, or maybe diced jalapenos, but not ground cayenne. The cayenne lent too much bite without the flavor to justify it.
What you should know: That thing about this recipe making quite the large pot: 6 quarts+

Mulled Wine
Ah. The mulled wine. Enunciate carefully when you tell people this is what you're going to be serving, else they'll think you're trying to pawn of some kind off moldy Halloweeny drink. But once they give it a try, it'll be gone before you know it. I've mulled a few wines in my day, but never really by recipe. This one (in my opinion) has a good ratio of water-to-wine, and (ingeniously; why didn't I think of this before?) boils the water with the sugar till the sugar is melted up good. The spice elements go in a tied-up bag of cheesecloth (also brilliant: no floaties in your mug). And - AND - it involves a vanilla bean. This was my very first. No scraping out the vanilla, just a slice down the length of the pod and then submersion. This is a fancy mulled wine. (Though I'm sure it would taste just fine without the vanilla bean.) And the requisite lemon and orange slices. I think the new seasonal rule in the Martin Household will be Mulled Wine starting October 31st. It just seems right.
What I did differently: I quadrupled the amount of wine, and thus water. Two (cheap) 1.5 L bottles of Burgundy and 6 cups water. However, I only used one vanilla bean and only doubled the amount of spices. More vanilla might have been tasty, but really, it was fantastic as-was. I'd estimate it filled 4 1/2 quarts of a pot, and after a party of 16 grownups, there're perhaps three mug-fulls left (in our fridge for reheating - is it okay to do that? I sure hope so, cause we're gonna.).

When Foodie Visits Foodie (including: a Granola recipe and instructions for Rosemary Balsamic Vinaigrette)

A week and a half ago, my dear friend Kristina of college days (Go Dawgs!) paid us a visit up in Blacksburg: four days of mountain-vista filled travel to-and-fro airport, marketing, cooking, baking, coffee drinking, lounging, more marketing, more cooking, more lounging. More coffee (Bollo's Pumpkin Pie Spice blend!). A late morning spent in Floyd with accompanying eating, shopping, and being one-with-the-culture (which Kristina will surely document in her next installment on Fungirl Cooks).

For now, I'll direct you to Kristina's account of our first fabulous day of cooking. Despite a full morning of air (Kristina) and road travel (me), we found our immediate way to the local market and then the Kroger, spent a happy hour catching up over an afternoon glass o' vino, and proceeded to heat up the kitchen to the tune of Cheddar Corn Chowder. To this initial evening's cooking venture, I have little to add besides: 1. Find this recipe and make it for yourself. It's a Barefoot Contessa; 2. Half the recipe unless you intend to feed a small army. Or if, like me, you plan to serve your family leftovers for the next week and a half (not actually a bad idea); 3. Consider leaving out the required cream addition - which, admittedly, is what makes it a "chowder." It is not necessary. The, um, butter, olive oil, bacon grease, creamy gold potatoes, sweet corn (especially if cut fresh from the cob), and generous portion of cheddar cheese are quite enough for fullness of flavor and texture. Look this recipe up now, immediately, while the first cool days of fall are inspiring you to eat hearty, comforting soups, and make it. You and your family can thank me later for how fantastically delectable your kitchen will smell.

On to Day Two of Kristina and Rebecca's Grand Culinary Adventures, Kristina's account of which I intend to supplement today with two relevant recipes: The Martins' favorite Granola and Rosemary-Balsamic Vinaigrette. Both are staples in the Martin household. Both are favorites of ours and relatively easy to make (if you don't mind a bit of a leftover mess). Both make me feel like I'm In Charge in my kitchen, which is a really good feeling, you know? So without further ado:

Granola de Martin

(adapted from Granola de la Arms, one of our favorite Charlottesville families. They follow the recipe pretty closely. I don't. And that's the beauty of this recipe for me.)

In large pot (5 quart +), warm over low heat, stirring periodically, till thin (without bringing to a boil):

1/2 c. light olive oil (or other oil with light flavor: canola, safflower)

1/2 c. to 1 c. honey or maple syrup, or combination of both

(note: I generally use a heaping 1/4 c. honey and 1/4 c. maple syrup for a lightly-sweetened-but-flavorful mix. The more honey or syrup added, the "bunchier" the granola will be; the less added, the more separated and dry/roasted the texture, the latter of which is our particular preference.)

Meanwhile, mix together in large bowl:

7 c. (generally 1/2 a large-sized oatmeal container) old-fashioned oats

1 c. wheat germ

1 1/2 c. flaked unsweetened coconut

2 c. nuts roughly chopped or crushed (whatever your preference! mine: pecan, walnut, almond)

optional: spices, to taste (cinnamon, allspice, nutmeg, ginger, cocoa)

When oil-and-sweetener mix is thinned and blended together, remove pot from heat and immediately stir in:

1 T. vanilla

Then add:

Dry mixture, above

Stir until dry mixture is well-coated. Line two baking sheets with aluminum foil and divide and spread granola mixture evenly across both sheets. Bake on low oven heat (200 - 250, depending on how "roasted" you'd like the results to be). After the first 30 minutes, remove baking sheets and stir mixture, adding in (if desired):

optional: 1 c. dried fruit (raisins, cranberries, blueberries, etc.)

Return sheets to oven and bake for 30 more minutes, or until granola reaches your preferred browned-ness. Remove granola from the cookie sheets to cool on the foil. Once cool, stir to break up larger pieces and roll the foil sides together to create a funnel for pouring the granola into an airtight container.

Makes: about 10 cups

Keeps: two weeks + in an airtight container

Optional adjustments:

• try this granola with more honey or syrup to result in a gooier, clumpier cereal;
• leave out the nuts, or leave nuts whole (or halved) for a crunchier granola experience;
• experiment with your favorite spices to larger and lesser extents (my favorite is a generous, several-Tablespoon inclusion of allspice);
• if you're short on the supplementary ingredients (fruits, nuts, coconut), bump up the spices (e.g. the granola Kristina had at our house and loved was sans nuts or fruits. To make it more interesting, I included all the spices generally used in gingersnaps: cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, ground ginger, cocoa.).

Rosemary Balsamic Vinaigrette

(This recipe is non-too altered from an Everyday Food recipe, found in an early 2009 issue. I made it first at the beginning of summer when our CSA was bestowing upon us all things green and leafy, and my salad-consuming life has never since been the same.)

In a food processor, combine

1/2 c. balsamic vinegar

1 T. Dijon mustard

1 small garlic clove

1 T. fresh rosemary leaves

2 T. water

1/2 t. coarse salt

1/4 t. ground pepper

Pulse steadily until smooth (though there may remain larger bits of rosemary leaves). With machine running, slowly drizzle in a thin stream:

1/2 c. extra virgin olive oil

(note: Drizzle/drip the olive oil as slowly as you can stand; I spend at least three minutes on this portion - after one impatient-and-thus-failed attempt involving pouring in the olive oil rather quickly; little emulsification resulted, the dressing was very separated. This dressing should be very smooth, requiring little shaking before use. To achieve that ideal consistency, be patient: drizzle the olive oil in sloooowly.)

Pulse steadily until creamy.

Makes: 3/4 cup

Keeps: 2 weeks + in an airtight container (I find that leftover jelly jars are ideal.)

Spicy Peanut Soup

I gave this one a post on down the rabbit hole last winter. Today was the day for its cold- weather, Fall 2009 resurrection . . . No part of me wanted to eat something so creamy, so spicy, so root vegetable-y during the summer months. But arrive fall, an evening of truly crisp weather, and Hello! peanut soup.

Quite the "hello" it was; last year, Kenton and I both particularly enjoyed this particular outcome of my Winter 2009 Soup Craze, but this time around, it was - somehow - even tastier than remembered. I determined (take note here) that the perfection of flavor arose from two new differences: homemade vegetable stock (rather than the store-bought stuff of yester-season) and a creamier-than-usual peanut butter. (We usually keep the natural must-stir stuff on-hand for the man's work lunches, which gets a bit dry down around the bottom. This week's canister is Kroger's crunchy organic which is non-stir and, I think, lended tonight's particularly creamy texture to the mix that was just . . . oh . . . so good.

There really are no words appropriate enough to describe the flavors that came together. You must try it for yourself, and now - cold weather ensuing - is just the time for it.

P.S. I tried to take a picture. (Read: I tried to get Kenton to take a picture whilst I ladeled.) My camera battery failed to comply. You can take my word for it: this soup is thick, brownish, and goopy-looking. So you really didn't need to see it in a photograph, after all.

A few more notes:

~ The chili powder could be increased for more heat for those of us with a Southwestern bent of taste bud. My New Englander husband likes it just as-is. (With the two Tablespoons, you get just a hint of hotness at the end of each swallow.) I also threw in a couple dashes of ground cayenne.

~ Yukon Gold (or another particularly creamy variety of) potatoes work best.

~ The soup can do without the corn and celery; just remember you'll lose the crunch that way. We actually like it better (it's more fallish/wintery) sans crunch.

~ Be careful of adding additional peanut butter, even if you're a peanut addict (like my husband). I've already bumped the PB content up a few notches from the original recipe. Any more, and you'll end up with Peanut Butter Soup, which is pretty gross. Trust me. (If you do go too heavy on the peanut butter, just dilute with more stock. And vice versa: if the soup is too soupy for you, add peanut butter . . . caaaarefully, though.)

Spicy Peanut Soup

2 T. extra virgin olive oil

1 large onion, diced

2 cloves garlic, minced

2 T. spicy (not sweet) chili powder

2 red bell peppers, seeded and finely chopped (*I used red carmen sweet peppers this time, with success)

2-3 medium carrots, finely chopped

2 large or 3 small/medium potatoes, finely chopped

optional: 3 celery sticks, sliced

4 cups vegetable broth (*homemade makes a huge difference!)

9 T. crunchy peanut butter (*trust me: you need the crunch)

optional: 2/3 c. corn, fresh or frozen

salt & ground black pepper

optional: unsalted roasted peanuts, fresh cilantro, and/or fresh parsley for garnish

1. Heat oil over medium heat in large pan (at least 3 quart-sized; a dutch oven is ideal) and cook onion for one minute, then garlic for an additional 1-2 minutes. Add chili powder and cook for about 1 minute more.
2. Add red peppers, carrots, potatoes, and celery. Stir well, then cook for further 4 minutes, stirring occasionally.
3. Add vegetable stock, followed by peanut butter and corn. Stir until peanut butter is thoroughly melted and combined.
4. Season with salt & pepper, to taste. Bring to a boil; cover and simmer for about 20 minutes, or until all vegetables are tender. (*this is where you will want to test for soupy-ness v. over-thickness and adjust with more PB or more stock.)
5. Optional: garnish with peanuts and cilantro or parsley for serving.

Salsa Verde

I'm momentarily between steps three and four (four and five?) of this recipe. It's not the recipe I'm going to tell you about today, though, since it's not yet made its way into (much less out of) the oven. I have high hopes for it, and will surely come back and tell all if those hopes come to fruition. But for now, another kind of fruit - or vegetable, if you feel more comfortable with that idea: the vibrant (verdant?), strange, and lovely tomatillo.

I have long held a distant interest in the tomatillo. They show up at our farmer's market weeks before the influx of red tomatoes, small, round, and curious in their decidedly non-tomato-like shells. (Not even the same vegetable, I know, but still - don't you think of them as similar, the tomatillo and the tomato? You have to draw comparison, you really have to. Because they are. Somewhat similar. The name dictates it.) And lo and behold, a bag of eight of these little green delights, packed happily in their crisp, green husks, arrived in my CSA bag on Tuesday. Tomatillos! I exclaimed. I've been wanting to try you! Why hadn't I bought them before now? Can't say - besides that abhorrence at tossing away uneaten produce and a fear that something so unknown to me might go the same way. But today - today, I have no excuse for not trying or for tossing, and I really don't want one. Because I have the tomatillos. (Tomatillos! Doesn't the word itself make you want to throw in an exclamation point?) And because -

Because bread-rising time is a great moment in which to squeeze ten minutes of such simple peeling and chopping as - it turns out - is all that is required for this version of salsa verde, for which I expect the local Mexican restaurants to soon be contacting me (if I do say so myself). The focaccia dough ball went into the bowl, under cover of requisite clean towel, and the tomatillos, jalepeno, and half-onion (leftover from Wednesday's tomato potato soup, which Kenton has dubbed Tomtato Soup) came out of the fridge for a quick shuck and slice and throw into the food processor. And now I have something - something with a satisfying convergence of heat, sweet, and salt - to tide me over till the bread's ready to accompany the leftover soup for dinner this evening.

The recipe is altered from one that actually came out in the "bag notes" of our (wonderfully organized and informative) local CSA. I made a number of prep simplifications and several ingredient changes, and am completely satisfied. Kenton just arrived home, tasted, and agreed.

Salsa Verde

Ingredients

4 medium tomatillos, husked, rinsed, and quartered

1 large garlic clove, peeled and quartered

Jalapeno pepper to taste (I found that a scant half of a medium-sized pepper added just the right amount of heat. And I was raised by Texans, so take that into consideration. You can always add more if it's not hot enough for you.)

1/2 or more cup loosely packed, roughly chopped cilantro

1/2 medium white or yellow onion

Lime juice (I used, ahem, bottled juice. Please don't judge. I'm sure fresh lime juice would be absolutely delightful.)

Directions

(Are you ready for how easy this is?) Combine the quartered tomatillos, garlic, pepper, and cilantro in the food processor. Puree! (Kind of requires an exclamation point, like "tomatillo!") till . . . pureed. Add lime juice and salt, pulse a couple times, and taste to see if more is needed. Add onions and pulse several times, until onion is chopped but a little chunkier than the rest of the mixture.

Pour into bowl. Go at it with a bag of chips. Share only if you want to.

Later, a recipe for homemade granola. Nearly-perfected and Kenton-approved.

Roasted Edamame

Is it a snack? A side? An appetizer? I don't know, and I don't care. I just want to eat more of its spicy, savory, soft crunchiness.

Adapted/simplified from recipe on Allrecipes.com

Ingredients

1 cup shelled fresh edamame

1-2 teaspoons olive oil (too much will make for oily beans)

1/4 teaspoon: chili powder, dried basil, ground cumin, paprika, cayenne pepper

1/8 teaspoon ground black pepper

salt to taste (don't need much)

*note: cayenne could be left out and/or chili powder reduced for less heat

Directions

Preheat oven to 375. Mix beans, oil, and spices in bowl and transfer to small cookie sheet, baking dish, or (for faster cleanup!) square of aluminum foil. Bake in oven for at least twenty minutes. Serve immediately (cold soybeans = ew). Enjoy the soft crunchiness! The crunchy softness! These were made to be shared. Yum.