When it's cold, make soup

It's been a couple of days since I sat down to write. It has been an interesting couple of days, with some rather "high end" changes going on in my life, some cosmetic, some not. I can't honestly say that I've assimilated them all. What I can say, is that it's all been for the good, including a reconciliation and, I think, deepending of my friendship with my friend - and bud - Andrew, and a realization of how much I care for our friends Craig and Ken, and how wise they both are. That's a lot, in and of itself, and there's more. But that will have to wait, as we get to the matter at hand, SOUP.

Late in growing season, and early in growing season, a farmer's market is a challenge. The ground has frozen, the farmers are tired, and the bottom line is, the bounty of October is a pleasant, winsome memory. Now you have several options: give up, and buy stuff at a good grocery store, eat out and spend a l ot of money, or embrace what is not, ultimately, a very difficult challenge.

I went to the market on Friday, in 20 degree weather. I came back with nearly more than I could carry. Stunning baby leeks, baby turnips,beets, baby carrots, celery roots, celery "per se," herbs, potatoes, fennel, a savoy cabbage, fennel. WOW.


Now, the thing is, these are all vegetables that you have to know what to do with. You can't just steam most of them (except maybe the carrots, and they won't taste very good when they're this young). So think about what you have: these are , for the most part, roots. And they are vegetables that do well in the cold. So, what do you like to eat in the cold?

SOUP! Just for the heck of it, I laid all these vegetables out in front of me, plus a big jar of chestnuts, and began writing down all the possibilities I could come up with. SO MANY. An obvious one is the wonderful vicchisoyse (which I'm misspelling, again), of leeks and potatoes, and there's the makings of superb mixed vegetable soup here. But I wanted "something different." And in an hour, I made two, very different soups: celery root with shrimp, and then bacon, fennel, and chestnut.

The basis to all of my soups is a foundation of aromatic vegetables. These change, depending on the soup, but they almost always include an onion variety of some kind, carrots, and celery. All of which I had right there. Now, for celery root soup, I'm going to have the celery flavor, so this time, I left the celery out. I chopped up a cup of leeks, using white and light green parts, and a whole bunch of the baby carrots. (When they are small, all you have to do is wash them. If you peel them, you'll lose half the vegetable). Then, because celery root seems to "love" butter, I sauteed those in half butter and half olive oil, while I prepped four small celery roots. I peeled them, and cut them into cubes, and when they were ready, I added a quart of chicken stock to my base veggies, and then the celery root and a nice, big teaspoon of salt. Celery roots need more time than the other ingredient going into this soup, which is potatoes, so while the celery root was cooking, I peeled and cubed an equal amount of potatoes. After I gave the celery root a head start of ten minutes, I added the potatoes and brought everything to a low simmer. After fifteen more minutes, everything was nice and soft. But the taste was strong. So I added a few cups of hot water. I stopped the cooking, and then when the stuff was cool enough to handle, I pureed it through the food mill.

THIS, was a mistake. When I finished the puree, I had somethng that looked, well, a little like bad cottage cheese. It tasted good, but let's face it boys and girls, we eat with our eyes. SO, while I didn't want to do it, I put everything into the blender, and crossed my fingers.

A correct decision if I say so myself. A few of the potatoes were red fleshed, and I had a wonderful salmon pink soup waiting there.

And THAT is what inspired the shrimp. See, I l iked the soup but it screamed for PROTEIN. Anything too strongly flavored just seemed wrong: this is a soup that screamed out to me to use seafood. And the color said "shrimp." So, in went a couple of pounds of the medium shrimp (why use the big ones? They're too big to put on your spoon, and frankly, I think the smaller ones taste better). Five minutes later, we were done.

It was good, and I will make it again. But now for something interesting. I brought this to our fisherman for his lunch and know what he did? He grabbed a handful of scallops, tossed them into the hot soup, and smiled.

Yup, you one upped me Phil, and I wish I had thought of that BUT.... when I ate mine for lunch, I said "CRABMEAT." Yup, this is a soup that would be just wonderful with crabmeat in it. If I can put together a dinner party of people in January who are not allergic to shellfish, guess what the first course is gonna be?


Now, to soup number two. The combination of fennel and chestnuts sounded so appealing. They both have a wonderful hidden sweetness, and unusual flavors, and it seemed they would work together.

A digression here. Some of you will have said "WAIT A MINUTE. Chestnuts out of a jar?"

Uh huh. Yes I've done the fresh chestnut route, glorifying in the fact that there are indeed American chestnuts again. And after cutting my fingers, spraining my thumbs, and having about a cup of chestnut meat, "As God is my witness, I will never peel my own chestnuts again."

There, I said it. Too much freaking work.

Now, again, I was confronted with the protein issue. And the anise flavor of fennel kept on saying pork. Bacon is my ingredient of the year. I haven't cooked with it much before this year, now I wonder how I did without it. And I had a pound of superb artisanal bacon in the fridge. I cut up half of it into chunks, and sauteed it in olive oil, while I prepped the veggies (most people don't realize that you DO have to start bacon in some fat. If you don't, it will burn. If you add some to start, yes, you do have to drain most of it off, but you will be glad for that extra tablespoon or so of olive oil, which makes your life easier).

Prepping the veggies meant simply slicing up the big fennel bulb I had into half moons, and chopping up t he chestnuts. Again, I started with carrots and onions, but this time, I used the fennel where I would have used the celery. What I did was, I took the bacon out, and let it sit and crisp up, thinking I'd use it as a garnish. That changed. Then I sauteed the carrots, onions and fennel in two tablespoons of reserved bacon fat, and I added a big sprig of rosemary at the last minute. This proved to be a good choice. When I began to hear a "crackle" in the v eggies, I added the chestnuts, stirred them in the fat, and added the chicken stock. A quart of it. I simmered for about twenty minutes, tasting as I went along. It was WONDERFUL. Like a bowl of sausages in liquid form. The bacon flavor, the rosemary and the fennel were all coming together.

Again, I went with the food mill and again, the look was "less than appealing." And the brown chestnut color wasn't helping any. So, yet again, the helpful blender came out and at the last minute I added the bacon and pureed it all together.

The soup is deceptively thin. Not as thick as I thought it would be, but this is a good thing, as it gives me leave to serve up something like a pizza or a quiche with the meal.

I'm still having second thoughts about pureeing the bacon. The soup sure tastes good, and again, I don't have to run around looking for my garnish at the last minute. You'll have to make the call on this.

And play with your food here folks. Make some changes. Use sage instead of rosemary. Use an onion instead of the leek. See what happens if you use sausage instead of bacon, and/or maybe add some rice or some pasta to the soup.

C'mon. Let's cook together. Show me what you can do.