Zuppa Toscana

If you've been to Olive Garden and had their version of this wonderful soup, I think you'll enjoy our version...they are almost identical!

you'll need:

2 links of Italian Sausage (not "hot", use "mild" or "sweet"), remove casings
2 strips of meaty bacon, optional
1/4 small onion, fine dice, optional
1 large russet potato, scrubbed, not peeled, quartered, then sliced into 1/4 inch slices
1 cup fresh chopped kale
6 cups good chicken stock
1 pint heavy cream, or half and half
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
kosher salt to taste

Heat a large stock pot, If you are choosing to use bacon cook it first. You're going to brown up the bacon, remove, set aside to cool a bit; then chop into tiny pieces - like baco-bits.
In the same pot add the sausage. Crumble and brown -and if you are choosing to add the onion, this is the time to saute it.

Drain as much of the drippings as you can from the pot. If you have quality sausage there shouldn't be too much fat left from it.

Add the stock, potato, kale, pepper flakes, and the chopped bacon to the sausage and onions. Bring the stock to a boil, then turn down and simmer until the potatoes and kale are tender.

Add cream ad bring back up to a simmer to heat. Do not boil! Boiling will curdle the cream. You can still eat it, but it's funky looking. bleh.

I like to serve this soup with fresh garlic bread and a veggie filled green salad.

You may want to salt to taste. I hardly ever use salt in my cooking, so give'er a taste and see if you need it. The soup has so much flavour I doubt you'll miss it, but hey, I won't be there, so don't feel guilty if you want to add it!

Enjoy!

Chicken Corn Soup

THE recipe for a crazy good chicken and corn soup --it turns out really flavourful and so delicious that I am wont to share it with you; so here goes:

I started by placing my washed and dried whole chickens, with their necks and gizzards etc. in my heavy enameled cast iron pot with a bit of butter, kosher salt, pepper corns, and crushed garlic -lots of garlic. I slow roasted those darling little chickens until they were tender, juicy juicy, and the joints easily tore from each other and the meat beginning to fall off the bone. From one chicken I took one full breast and thigh and chopped it into big bite sized chunks; and set it aside.

Ingredients:

1 chicken whole chicken breast -roasted and chopped into bite sized chunks
1 chicken thigh - roasted and chopped into bite sized chunks
4-5 pieces of meaty bacon, fried, diced - if you buy good quality meaty bacon you will not need to drain the fat. You will be cooking veggies in it, and what's left after that will get emulsified into the soup.
1/2 yellow onion - diced
1 small red pepper - diced
1 large jalapeno pepper - diced
1 russet potato - peeled and diced
2 cups fresh or frozen corn
2 cups sharp cheddar cheese - shredded
3 cups good stock
cream -ifin ya wanna


In another heated heavy pot I fried up four pieces of really meaty bacon. When the bacon was just about done I added the onion, red pepper, jalapeno, potato and corn. Saute the veggies with the bacon until they begin to caramelize, they don't all have to turn deep brown, but some should. Pull the bacon out and give it a good dice, return it to the pot and add the corn and stock. Bring to a low boil and simmer until the potato is fork tender.

Take about half of the soup, both veggies and stock and toss into a blender. Keep the lid on, but the cap out, cover with a small towel and pulse to puree the contents. Return this to the pot and fold into the soup.

Add the cheese, blend. Add the chicken, fold in and bring back up to a low simmer to reheat chicken. Do not bring the soup up to a boil or you will curdle the cheese! It will still taste fine, it will just look funky. Taste to season with kosher salt and fresh black pepper. Serve.

Originally I was going to add heavy cream to the soup, however in the long run (read:standing under the ladder doing some painting) I forgot to! It didn't matter, it was still so flavourful! And the best part? It was even more tasty the next day for lunch...really really good for lunch! If you want to - go ahead and add some cream!