Quick Post: Appreciation

There's really not much better than when the person you care for states his enjoyment of a dish you've thrown together.  He really likes when I roast a chicken (I got another one at the Farmers Market this morning, so roast chicken is coming this week), and that's nothing fancy.  He likes when I do the salmon on papillotte, and that's just putting some stuff in tin foil and throwing it in my oven.


So two nights ago when I made another version of my Melting Pot Soup, and he told me that he really liked it, his praise put a smile on my face.  This time, in addition to the chicken feta spinach sausage, I used some whole wheat elbow macaroni instead of orzo, baby bok choy, celery, onions, carrots, dried oregano, dried basil, and some red pepper flakes. 

He loves it.  And it's really easy to make.  There's still a lot left, but it's going quick.

melting pot soup

I am very blessed to have a wonderful brother-in-law. While he has innumerable pride-inducing characteristics (great husband and great father just to name two), one of my favorites is his interest in food. He works to create the epicurious.com website and has a non-work-related love of cooking interesting meals. At one point, he was making his own cheese in their ground floor tiny kitchen. Amazing.

At some point he and I were talking about some sort of Italian wedding soup. I don't know where that name came from, but I must have recently seen a can of Campbell's Italian-Style Wedding Soup ("Meatballs and Spinach in Chicken Broth" as it is described on the label). I think he had also told me of a version he made, and it piqued my interest.

I figured, instead of meatballs I could use the feta and spinach chicken sausage my local grocery store sells. I seared it off and chopped it into large-ish bite-sized bits. The mirepoix would, of course, stay the same (carrots, celery, and onions). And while the sausage was searing in another pan, the mirepoix would get things going in my large pasta pot. Once those had sweated out, I added in some chicken stock. I don't remember how much, but definitely too much. I ended up having an entire pasta pot full of this soup. But wait, I've gotten ahead of myself.

Right after I added the chicken stock, I started cutting up my bok choy and giving it a quick rinse. That's what I was substituting for the spinach...a decidedly non-Italian ingredient, as far as I know. I threw in the sausage since, while seared, it needed to be cooked through. I added some more water (as if there needed to be more volume). Then after a few minutes of boiling, I added the orzo. Did I mention that's what I replaced the little nondescript pasta balls in the Campbell's soup with tri-color orzo. It is a favorite of mine.

Not much longer after that I added in the bok choy. Some hot red pepper flakes and some freshly ground black pepper joined in on the fun. Not much salt was needed since broth usually takes care of itself. As you can see from the next picture, I made A LOT of the stuff.

The way I figure, this melting pot soup sums up the various cultures to which I was exposed as a child growing up in New York. Every family had Chinese food from time to time (my Jewish friends always having big family dinners at the Chinese restaurant on Christmas, a tradition of which I was mildly jealous). And though we ate Chinese food fairly regularly, I am aware that it pales in comparison to the real deal. But what can I say...my mother could eat her weight in Schezhuan green beans (though, being a bean pole herself, I suppose that is not much of a feat). And, of course, Italian food was ubiquitous in the city. Even though we were a borough away from Little Italy proper, we were only a few blocks up the hill from a neighborhood whose light poles were painted the green, white, and red of the Italian flag. And then Campbell's soup - I have such distinct memories of their "alphabet soup" from childhood. This might sound gross to many, but we added milk to our beef broth-based alphabet soup. It cooled the soup down to suit our childhood palettes, but more importantly, it's what our mom and dad did, so it was the right way to eat your soup. The next step, of course, was to crumble Premium Saltines (original, thank you very much) into the soup by the handful. That is still one of my go-to soups when I need something comforting.

In any event, it's a soup informed by my culinary past in the Melting Pot of all Melting Pots. And it's darn tasty.

A Lunch Person

When I was three, I attended a half-day session at the school down the block from where I lived. Being the "older than my time" girl from an early age, I was bothered by the fact that there were other kids (some 4 years old, some 3) who were staying there for the entire day. I wanted to be a "Lunch Person" like those who stayed until the afternoon. My mother, wanting to support her youngin's desires, would pack me a lunchbox that I could bring to school, even though I didn't eat it there. I was a Lunch Person.

I am again a Lunch Person. I have begun bringing my lunchbox to work. Yes, you read that right. I'm in my 30s, and I bring a lunchbox to work. Think a modern bento box, less disposable packaging, healthier meals, and downright cuteness. My lunch box is made by Oots. I am in love with it. It has all these cool little containers inside, and if you get the "Deluxe" version, it comes with one large and four small plastic containers that fit inside. (You can also buy it without the inserts.) I was lucky enough to receive one of these beauties from my sister and brother-in-law as a birthday present back in the beginning of May (everyone...mark your calendars for next year...). But it took me a couple months to get in the swing of actually using it as intended. There have been a couple days I've trotted along with a frozen meal inside, but that's not nearly as exciting.

So I gave myself an assignment. Go to the farmers' market (see my previous post called The Prodigal Daughter), buy some tasty vittles, and make sure to eat healthily with the help of my Oots Lunchbox. I started with some fruit. I cut my orange in the "Chinese restaurant" style way, as my mother calls it - in half from pole to pole then slice parallel to the equator. It's the best way to eat an orange. You can just rip the flesh out with your teeth and you barely get any pith.

Next came blueberries. A ton of blueberries in another small bin. They are so easy to snack on throughout the day. I love the way they pop in the mouth.

I also packed one of these little squares with cheese and crackers. It was some delicious Colby that I got at the farmers' market (my dog also likes it...he likes cheese). The Colby was firm, but not oppressively so - it didn't hurt my gums when I chomped down on a big cube. The crackers I used were, brace yourself, good ol' Premium Original Saltines. I know that this Colby could have stood up to a Carr's cracked pepper of a similarly spiced cracker, but there's just something about those Premium Saltines. I love them. One thing I didn't really think about, though, was that the moisture from the cheese made the crackers a little less than desirable in texture. But don't get me wrong, I still ate them. You can't beat the perfect amount of salt on those things.

Lastly, as mentioned in my last post, I had done up some zucchini and and steak in the same grill pan. I had some leftovers in the longer of the plastic bins. Boy were they tasty.

Tomorrow I'm taking another meal. Dark sweet cherries and green grapes in two small bins. Another small bin has some tuna salad (tuna, light mayo, celery, dill pickles, celery seed, salt, and pepper), and the fourth has some more dill pickle spears and some more celery. The big bin has two pieces of Nature's Pride Double Fiber bread (remarkably tasty for how much fiber is in them, and I can toast them at work and make my tuna sandwich) and a handful of Marcona almonds (that are absolutely irresistible).

I'm hungry just thinking about it.