Why I Love Soup

....because I almost always have ingredients on hand for delicious soup.


....because it's a good way to get veggies into my kiddo.


....because it's easy to make a whole bunch at once.


....because soup usually freezes well.


....because if it doesn't taste great at first, there are easy ways to make it tastier (although not necessarily healthier, but refer to #2 to clear your conscience about that).


Ok... so now for the only reason I don't like soup: I don't really know how to write a recipe for my favorite soups because I just sort of make them. You know? So, here's my disclaimer: if you are a comfortable cook and you don't need a line-by-line recipe, keep reading. If you don't know your way around the kichen so well yet, come back another day for a real recipe. Or come over and watch me :)

So let me tell you about one of the new soups that I tried recently that my whole family loved (kind of a big deal). I called my mother-in-law the other day and as often happens with her and I, we ended up talking about yummy things we've recently made. She told me about a squash soup that immediately got my attention because we'd been getting a lot of yellow squash in our produce co-op and I was growing weary of sauteeing it or dipping raw pieces in ranch. I modified her recipe based on what I had and what we like, and here's what I did:


Squash Soup

1) Cut 2 pieces of bacon in small pieces (I use my kitchen shears to make it an easy job) and sautee with a diced onion (I sometimes use frozen chopped onion if I'm in a hurry. Or feeling lazy.), carrots and celery.

Optional: Add about 2 T. of flour and stir constantly for about 3 minutes. Add about one cup of broth and stir until smooth. This will make the soup a little thicker, and I don't always do it.

2) Add however many diced yellow squash, zucchini and sweet potatoes you have (I used 3 yellow squash and 1 sweet potato, but you can adjust according to your family's taste or according to what you have on hand) and sautee for about 10 minutes, or until the veggies get soft-ish).

3) Add the remaining broth (I used 2 cartons total) according to how much soup you want and how chunky you want it to be

Optional: Add half and half or heavy whipping cream according to taste, to make a creamy soup (And to get some extra calcium, or at least that's how I justify it). I used about 1/2 cup of heavy whipping cream because that's what I had on hand.

Optional: Add a dash of cayenne. I think this is what made the soup so yummy, and the heat can be as mild or intense as you want. My family loves heat so I used a generous dash and everyone was happy. A scant dash would still be kid-friendly.

4) Let it simmer for about 30 minutes.

Optional: I like to smash up some of the vegetables to make a thicker soup and to make sure my daughter doesn't pick them out. I wish I had an immersion blender but I don't, so I just use a potato masher until it looks the way I want it to.

Serve with parmesan cheese. Delicioso!

I had planned on this soup being enough for a couple of meals, but it was such a hit that it was gone in one night. Lily, 3, who sometimes consumes less than 10 calories a day, ate 3 bowls! Kyle, who usually groans at soup, gave it a glowing review instead of his normal pat answer about soup being just alright (he gets points for being honest).

This soup has three of my old standbys for making soup extra delicious, plus one new one. My old ones are bacon, cream and parmesan, which would even make my shoe tasty. My new one is cayenne. I think it added a great element to otherwise ordinary ingredients and yet didn't make it too exotic, and thus unedible by the fam.

Let me know what your "old standbys for deliciousness" are, and what variations you've tried for a soup like this.