Return of Soup Season...

I botched the recipe link in the previous post. Here is the correct one and it is a delight; we had it again tonight and it was wonderful.

Oh and Meg pointed out that I neglected to mention that it is balsamic vinegar that gives that delicious tang; don't use cider vinegar here. Enjoy!

Soup Season

It is officially soup season here in Vermont. It's been a cold winter for the most part but extremely dry resulting in almost no snow. The landscape is more brown than white which is very strange. The wind has been blowing all the time it seems and outside activities are just not that appealing to me. Combine that with the crappy economic times, crazy gun toting biology professors, and the ongoing struggle with both the Man and my waistline and it seems like a good time for some warm, comforting and healthy soup.

For some reason, I have very little history with soup so I'm happy that in recent times we've added to our vegetarian repertoire a simple delicious little recipe for Tomato and Lentil Soup. The bold helping of lentils gives the soup a heartiness that both satisfies your hunger and provides a great helping of protein and fiber at the same time. In fact googling lentils provides links with titles like "Worlds Healthiest Foods" so any delicious way to get them is OK with me.

The recipe is basic - lots of onions, carrots, celery, and garlic chopped finely and sautéed in a big cast iron dutch oven. The recipe urges you to use a food processor to save time but since we finally have some sharp knives around the house (Santa brought us a knife sharpener that really works), I enjoyed it the old fashioned way. Once the veggies are tender you add in a bunch of water, several cups of lentils (I used red though I read that the green lentils are higher in fiber), some tomato sauce along with a dash (actually a tablespoon or two) of vinegar which adds a nice tang to the project. A couple bay leaves and a deadly dried red chili or two and you're good to go. We simmer this for about a half hour or forty minutes and then serve with a couple black olives and some crumbled feta cheese for a delicious satisfying meal.

With this delicious and hearty soup and a nice warming brew, the soul and the body is nourished and the wind not quite so biting. Add in a dash of humanity from the Olympic Games and even the Man can be sent packing.

Buvez: The folks at Smuttynose rule our house this time of year. Their Wheat Wine Ale is a strong and reliable partner to this soup.
 

Pipérade with Poached Eggs

So due to my overzealous behavior at the Co-Op's deli counter Friday evening, we had a bit of pancetta left over after building the Pasta e Fagioli last night. Meg searched around for a good recipe to use it up as part of our Sunday Brunch program. She stumbled on this recipe for something called Pipérade. She also found that Julia had a similar recipe calling for ham. They both looked pretty standard with sautéed onions and peppers - you know - the standard stuff.

Boy were we wrong!

First I noted that the onions and peppers were to be sliced longways rather than being diced; not a big deal but this tells you something about what you're making. Next I find that instead of sautéing the vegetables, we are really slow cooking them until they are very soft and tender. By the time I added the sherry (a bit for the Pipérade, a bit for me!) and the red wine vinegar (we didn't have sherry vinegar), both Meg and I realized we were not in Kansas anymore.

So to back up, I started by sautéing the pancetta until crispy and then removing from the pan and reserving it for later. Next I added the onions, peppers and garlic to the same pan, sautéed briefly and then reduced the heat for 20 or 30 minutes cooking slowly without browning the vegetables.

Now the fun begins. We added chopped roma tomatoes, the vinegar & sherry, stock (we used good vegetable stock) and the reserved pancetta. I brought this to a boil and then strongly simmered the mixture to reduce and thicken a bit.

It's at this point that Meg and I realize we are not making an egg dish at all: we're making a delicious tangy stew with pancetta and vegetables into which we are going to drop a couple gently poached (OK, the first two were overdone) eggs. As Julia suggests, you really should read the recipe before you make it.

The result was unlike anything we'd ever had before; a tangy rich stew with precious prizes of pancetta combining with rich bits of poached egg. Oh and it was beautiful too; richly colored with green peppers and tomatoes. If we had our own food joint, this would definitely be on the brunch menu!

So it turns out this Basque food is often made with serrano ham (instead of pancetta) but otherwise is very similar to what we made. A bit of surfing reveals a restaurant of the same name in the Bay area which looks very tempting indeed.

Buvez: we had some delicious prosecco (operating from a number of white wine recommendations) but I think it was overmatched. This is beer food. Next time I might try indulging in the sweet maltiness of the Smuttynose Wheat Wine - a current cold Vermont winter warmer favorite of mine. Next time indeed...