Lasagna Soup

I got this recipe from one of my co-workers at my new job (see last post). I had a feeling my husband would love it, since he loves Lasagna, and he absolutely did. It was pretty fast and easy too! My kind of recipe!1 lb. ground beef
1 onion
3 tsp. garlic, minced (I used less...)
1 1/2 tsp. oregano
1/2 tsp. pepper
pinch of salt
1/4 tsp red pepper flakes
1 small can tomato paste (I didn't have any paste, so I used tomato sauce)
3 cans diced tomatoes
3 cans chicken broth
12 oz. corkscrew pasta (I used penne because I didn't have corkscrew)
3 tsp. basil
6 Tbsp Parmesan cheese
6 oz. Cottage cheese blended until smooth
1 1/2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese (or any other kind of cheese for the top)

In a large pot over med. heat, saute the onions and gr. beef, breaking it up into small pieces, about 5-7 minutes. Drain excess grease from the pot. Add the garlic, pepper, salt, oregano, and red pepper flakes and saute for another minute. Add the tomato paste (or sauce) and saute until the paste turns a rusty brown-- about 5 minutes.
Add the tomatoes with their juices and the broth and bring it to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for about 30 minutes. Add the pasta, increase the heat to medium and boil until the pasta is tender. Depending on the type of pasta you use, this time will vary greatly. Penne takes considerably longer to soften than other kinds of pasta. Stir in the basil and season with salt and pepper. Add the blended cottage cheese and parmesan and stir. Serve with extra mozzarella or some other kind of cheese on top. YUM!

Moroccan Carrot Soup

Once again, another delicious soup recipe from my oldest sister.
(That pumpkin one was hers too)
Ingredients:
2 T butter
1 cup chopped white onion
1 pound large carrots, peeled, cut into 1 inch chunks
2 1/2 cups veggie or chicken broth
1 1/2 t ground cumin
1 T honey
1 t lemon juice
1/8 t ground allspice
1/2 cup plain yogurt or milk

Directions:
Saute onion in butter or oil until translucent. Mix in carrots and broth and bring to boil. Simmer until carrots are very tender, about 20 minutes. Remove soup from heat and puree in blender until smooth. Return to pan and whisk in honey, lemon juice, allspice, cumin, and yogurt or milk. Sean with salt and pepper to taste. Can serve over rice.

Crock Pot Version: Saute onion in butter over stove. When translucent, transfer to crock pot with carrots and broth and leave on low for 5-6 hours or on high 3-4 hours. When ready puree in blender and return to crock pot to add honey, lemon juice, allspice, cumin and yogurt/milk. Season with salt and pepper and serve!
I served it with bread from our breadmaker this time... YUM!

Number Of Servings:4 lg servings (155 cals/bowl) or 6 small ones

Once again.. Orange soup is really hard to make appealing- looking in pictures... but trust me... Its delicious!

Curried Pumpkin Soup

As the season is changing **sigh** it seems that I am feeling like making more and more soups and breads. That is just what sounds good at the end of a cold Fall day(or is it already Winter here in Idaho?) .

This is a delicious, smooth, creamy soup. I got this recipe from my oldest sister and even her kids love it!

4-5 cups pumpkin
(see this post on baking your pumpkin from Halloween!)
2 T. olive oil
1 T. butter
1/2 large onion, chopped into large pieces (Don't waste your time chopping these up teeny... They will be blended at the end)
5 cups chicken broth
2 potatoes, peeled and chopped into small pieces (helps to cook faster!)
2 tsp. grated orange zest (if you don't have this, don't worry... I didn't!)
1 1/2 tsp. curry powder
1/2 cup cream or milk (I just used milk)
salt and pepper to taste

Directions:
In large pot heat olive oil and butter. Then add onion and fry until translucent. Add the broth, pumpkin and potato, and orange zest and raise the heat to high. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low, cover and simmer until the potatoes are tender, (25-30 minutes).

Working in batches, transfer soup to a blender and puree until smooth. Place over low heat and stir in milk and curry powder. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Heat to serving temperature and enjoy. My sister says she likes to eat this in bowls over hot rice, but we just ate it like regular soup with yummy homemade rolls.P.S. Is there a way to make orange soup look attractive in food pictures? I'm pretty sure orange is the hardest color to photograph for food!

Grandma Stott's Stew

Okay, so I don't have a Grandma Stott, but this is a recipe that I got from a good friend of mine and she has a Grandma Stott!. I have featured a couple other recipes of hers on here... Super easy and VERY delicious! We LOVED this. I have to warn you- My house smelled very strong like onion while this was cooking, but the onion wasn't overpowering when you eat it. It was delish- and my house had that "stew" smell for a few days after, but totally worth it!

I am going to give you the whole recipe, but I only made half of this- and you can see in the pictures how much only half makes!
3-4 lb. pork roast
4 medium onions chopped
4 cups carrots cubed
1 cup celery chopped (unfortunately, I only had celery flakes, but real celery would have definitely been better!)
2 cans tomato soup
2-3 Tbsp. sugar
2 tsp. salt
2 cans water

Place thawed roast in roasting pan (or 9x13 if you don't have a roasting pan, like me!). Sprinkle veggies on top and around roast. (I cut my roast up into smaller pieces because I was a little short on time to cook it. If you only have 4 hours instead of the 5-6, just cut your meat up into smaller pieces!)Mix soup, sugar, salt and water and pour over roast. Sprinkle with garlic and cover with roasting pan lid or just with foil (like me!). Bake 5-6 hours at 300. When done, shred pork and mix really well. Serve over mashed potatoes.

Chicken and Dumplings Soup

YUM YUM YUM

I know many of you live in areas where the weather is very cold right now. We had a cold streak here in El Paso last week (the high was 42 degrees!) During that "cold" week here, I was really feeling like something warm to eat. I saw this recipe of Monica's over on Lick the Bowl Good a while back and had it bookmarked and I've been meaning to try it for a long time.

Finally, we had some cold weather and it was the perfect time. It was so delicious! So, from her blog, here is the recipe. (BTW... you should check out her blog... she has so many delicious recipes.)

Stew:

• 3 Tbsp. butter
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 1 bunch celery, chopped
• 1 whole chicken fryer (about 4 lbs.) (I used boneless, skinless chicken breasts)
  
• 3 chicken bouillon cubes
• 6 cups chicken broth or water
• salt and pepper to taste

In a large pot over high heat, saute onions, celery and bouillon cubes in butter til tender. Add whole chicken (or whatever chicken you are using!) to pot and cover with 6 cups water or chicken stock. Cook over medium heat til chicken is cooked through.

Once chicken is cooked through, pull out and place on a cutting board. Once cool enough to handle, take off all the meat and shred into bite sided pieces. Add chicken back to pot and season with salt and pepper to your liking. Bring to boil.

While the chicken stew is coming to a boil, make the dumplings:

Dumplings:

• 2 cups flour
• 4 tsps. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 2 Tbsp. dried basil (optional)
• 2 Tbsp. Crisco shortening
• 3/4 -1 cup buttermilk
  
• (I never have buttermilk! Check at the bottom for my tips on making buttermilk)
  

In a medium bowl, combine flour, baking powder, salt and dried basil. Mix dry ingredients and cut in shortening with a fork or a pastry cutter. Stir dough while adding buttermilk. Start with 3/4 cup and add more til completely moistened and biscuit like but not wet.

Drop by the spoon full onto the boiling stew. Do not stir dumplings. Reduce heat to low and cover pot with a tight fitting lid. Allow dumplings to steam for 15 minutes. Once dumplings are cooked through, stir dumplings into the stew and serve. The flour from the dumplings will thicken the stew.

TIPS:

1. I knew this would make a TON of soup, and since we are a family of three, I halved the recipe. (the full recipe is listed above, but I just used half for my family)

2. The other thing I would suggest is to cut back the amount of basil just a little. I found the recipe to be really strong in that taste. It was delicious, but I think most kids wouldn't like the strong taste of basil. I would probably halve that amount again when I make this next time.

3. Buttermilk: I never have it! Just use 1 cup milk (I used whole, since I have a baby that drinks it...) with 1 Tbsp. lemon juice or vinegar and let sit for 5-10 minutes to kind of "sour" your milk a little.... It makes perfect buttermilk!

Easiest Potato Cheddar Soup

This recipe I am going to share comes from my Mother-in-Law. While we were down in Idaho, my MIL managed to have 26 people at her house for Thanksgiving without going crazy. That's quite the accomplishment if you ask me. I wasn't even in charge of the dinner and thought I might go crazy. Hats off to her! Once most people had left and it was just the immediate family at the house, she made this yummy soup for us. She got home and 25 minutes later dinner was ready. SERIOUSLY. I was absolutely amazed and the soup was so yummy! I asked her for the recipe and I have to share it with you. The only picture I have of it is the picture of the jar that we are giving away as Christmas gifts this year. I am so tired of giving/receiving plates full of cookies that nobody eats. Or that I eat and I just feel sick after... Ugh...

I thought this was a great idea to give as a Christmas gift without overloading anyone on more SWEETS!

Here are the ingredients:

2 cups potato flakes
2 cups coffee creamer
3/4 cup powdered cheese
1/2 cup imitation bacon bits
1 tsp Mrs. Dash
2 Tbsp. dried parsely
1 tsp dried minced onion
1/2 tsp. pepper

Add all ingredients to 6 cups boiling water. Mix well and let stand 5 minutes before serving. Depending on the potato flakes you use, you may have to use more water. My MIL uses the potato pearls from the church and it uses more like 8 cups water. I would start with 6 and see how its thickening up.

Here's a couple tips:
1. If you are making this as a gift, be sure to use IMITATION bacon bits so that whoever you give this to can put it on their shelf until they want to use it, instead of in their refrigerator.

2. The only thing I had a hard time finding was the powdered cheese. If you live where you have access to a WinCo, my MIL says that they sell it in bulk there. I couldn't find anywhere that sold it, so I had to order a #10 can of it off a website I found.

3. Also, if you are making this, use the wide mouthed quart jars and use a little less than 2 cups of the potato flakes and creamer. Be sure to jam your hand down in it and compress the flakes as much as possible in order to fit everything. I pushed and pushed and pushed in order to make everything fit.

I have this in my crockpot right now for a luncheon I'm going to today and I cannot wait to have it again (especially since I'm lactose intolerant.... and the coffee creamer is lactose free!!)

Corn Chowder

So, I know that most of my "readers" are in colder parts of the US than I am. The other day (it was probably in the mid 80's) I had the cooler on and I was cold. So I decided to make soup and corn bread. It was very yummy and I thought my friends who are actually having colder weather might appreciate this!
Ingredients:
1 can corn (drained)
1/2 cup chopped onion (or 4 Tbsp. dried chopped onions
1 Tbsp. cooking oil
1 14 ounce can chicken broth
1 cup cubed peeled potato (about 1 medium potato)
4 tsp. all purpose flour
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
1 1/2 cups milk
3 slices bacon, crisp cooked, drained and crumbled

In a large saucepan, cook onion in hot oil until tender but not brown. Stir in the chicken broth and potato. Bring to boiling; reduce heat. Simmer, covered for 10 minutes. Stir in corn. Cook covered about 10 more minutes or until potato is tender, stirring occasionally.

In a small bowl combine flour, salt and pepper. Add milk in to flour mixture; add to corn mixture in saucepan. Cook and stir until slightly thickened and bubbly. Cook and stir for 1 more minute (I let mine go for a while on the stove). Add crumbled bacon just before serving.

Makes 4 servings. Serve with corn bread... Delish

***Sorry about the crappy pictures.. Seriously. I am not impressed with my camera. It takes HORRIBLE indoor pictures (Nikon Coolpix S220) Don't ever get it...

Meatball Soup

This yummy recipe came from my friend Ashley. We tried it last night and it was great! It hit 3pm yesterday and I hadn't even thought of dinner and Josh said he'd be on his way home in a couple hours and was starving... So I threw this in my crock pot and away we went! I halved this recipe and we still had TONS left over! (so... plan according to your family size! I might even third this next time for us!)

6 cups water
4 cubes chicken bouillon
1 jar spaghetti sauce
meatballs
egg noodles

Mix first 4 ingredients in a crock pot on high heat. Most crock pots should take 3-4 hours, but mine is super fast (and I boiled the water in the microwave before I added it... Because I needed it to hurry!)

20-30 minutes before serving, add egg noodles and they should be perfect when you serve it. Serve topped with a little bit of mozzarella cheese. We also had fresh Parmesan cheese, so we threw some of that on too! This was delicious and even the little B-man approved (who went straight into the bath after dinner!)