Fresh, or canned? Still good: Roasted red pepper soup

Ciao, ragazzi.  Today, we are going to begin prepping ourselves for the winter, by making a soup from mostly fresh ingredients, but also by being mindful that it will be winter soon, and that is no excuse for not making a delicious meal.

Let Annalena explain:  in general, she frowns upon using canned goods, unless the good in question is one that is not available to her in good quality, or just is not available, period.  A very good example of this, is coconut milk.  Annalena CAN make coconut milk, but....  it would not be pretty. 

A better example for most of us, is canned tomatoes.  For that period of time that always seems too brief  and when fresh tomatoes that are local, smell like sun, and are reasonable in price, we must ALL use them. That window, however, is always short. So, you should have canned tomatoes on hand, ALWAYS.  You will see all kinds of reviews as to which brand is the best. Annalena says you should use what you like.  She did that here. 

What you see below you, are the ingredients for this soup:  on the far left, are four roasted red peppers.  Then a quart of stock, 1/4 cup of Italian rice, a 28 ounce can of chopped tomatoes, cinnamon (yes, cinnamon.  We won't use a lot but we will use it), and the "holy trinity" of soup making:  carrot, celery and onion. 

Annalena had a lot of beautiful fresh red peppers available to her.  If you do not, get jars of the roasted ones.  When you buy these, shop CAREFULLY.  The roasted flavor is important here, and not all jarred peppers are roasted. Most of the Italian brands are.  In fact, if you look through the glass of the jar, you may see some char marks.  Buy those.  You need four peppers for this dish, and a jar of roasted peppers rarely has more than 2.  Do the math.  And if you have more than you need, use them in the soup.

If you are fortunate enough to have fresh ones, turn your oven to the broil mark, put your peppers on a baking sheet, and get them as close to the heat source as you can, without touching it.  Adjust your oven racks if you must.  It's not hard.  After 5 minutes, check.  If the peppers have blackened, rotate them.  And so on, and so forth, until the entire pepper is black.  Carefully move them to a bowl, and now cover them, so they steam cool.  When they're cool enough to handle, the blackened skin will come right off. 

Yes, this is tedious.   But there's no work involved, and in the interim, you can get to work on your other vegetables:

What you have here is a large carrot, chopped, and two stalks of celery, also chopped. You do not see the large yellow onion, but chop one of those too, and don't worry about surgical precision. You also don't see four garlic cloves, which you will peel, and chop.  Now, add two tablespoons of olive oil to a big soup  pot, and add the onion, carrot and celery.  Cook these, for about five minutes, stirring as you go:

 Now, we're getting there!  Here's where you open up the tomatoes, and pour them in.   Add about 1/4 teaspoon of cinnamon  (don't omit it, and use a small amount.  You'll notice it).  Reduce your heat to medium, and let this bubble for about ten minutes:

 Just about home, kids.  After the ten minutes, add your peppers, cut up roughly, the basil, a quart and a half of stock of some kind.  Annalena used chicken diluted with water.  Use vegetable if you like.  Taste a bit of this.  You'll want salt and pepper.  Also, if you have some fresh basil, add a couple sprigs.  And add that rice.  

Let this all cook away for twenty minutes or so, and check to see if it's "done" by tasting a rice grain to check.

Annalena almost stopped here. She didn't.  She got this recipe from Martha Rose Schulman's column, and the notes to the recipe were very clear, that pureeing it, added flavor.  Dubious of this, Annalena tried a small bowl at this point, and then afterwards.  The pureeing IS a good idea. So let the soup cool,  and then puree it in small batches:

Look at that color!  Can you stand it?  You won't taste rice grains, but you do have a nice thick soup, that is.... GLUTEN FREE.  If you used vegetable stock, it's.... VEGETARIAN..  And, it's... VEGAN.

So, there you have it.  A soup that can be made from what's fresh, or from what's in jars and cans.  What could be bad about that?  Make yourself some grilled cheese sandwiches, (unless you're a vegan), and you've got dinner.

Back soon, ragazzi, with a Venetian soup for cabbage, the vegetable of the moment in Annalena's home.