Q&A meme answer Jan 31
Jan. 31st, 2015 08:42 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cairistionaJanuary 31: 
layne67 Your favourite dish ever and its recipe :)
Hmmm... I've been thinking about this for over a month now and I'm not entirely sure what to choose. So many of my meals these days are very simple--some fish and veggies or chicken and veggies, or something that's not really something that has a "recipe" so much as "assemble on a plate". LOL
But I do make a few dishes that are more involved, the best of which are usually soups, so here's one of my family's favorites. Not sure how many, if any, of the ingredients are available in your country, Layne, but you can substitute ingredients based on what you have on hand--this is, if nothing else, a base recipe for creamy soup that can be altered to suit your tastes. Bear in mind the amounts are only approximate because I'm very much a "put in however much I think it needs" kind of cook. Also, measurements are old school American but no worries because none of this needs to be especially precise, which is the nice thing about soup and probably why I make it so often. I've added in links to images of the products I use.
Sausage, potato & leek soup
1 package of breakfast link sausage, cut up in 1/2 inch slices
1 large leek, white portion only sliced into thin disks and thoroughly washed (to clean leeks, after I've cut it, I separate it into little rings and immerse them in the bowl of my salad spinner, then I run them through rinse/drain/spin twice, just to be sure the grit is all gone). If you don't have leeks in your area, you can use a mild yellow onion or shallots.
Olive oil, enough to cook the sausage and leeks, about 2 tablespoons
1 tablespoon flour (optional)
4-5 medium potatoes, peeled and diced
2 cans of chicken broth
1 cup of heavy cream
1 cup of half & half (which is half milk/half cream)
Water & chicken boullion if needed (I use McCormick Chicken Base, which is a sort of paste form of boullion that tastes far better than traditional bouillion cubes. It can be hard to find, though, so use whatever you have available)
Ground black pepper to taste
Heat up a large soup pot, preferably one with a good thick bottom, over medium heat. Add olive oil and when it starts to shimmer, toss in the sausage. When the sausage is about halfway done, toss in the leeks so they can soften up. Here's the optional bit: personally, I don't do this step because I think the starch from the potatoes thickens the broth sufficiently, but if you like a really thick soup, once the sausage and leeks are done, remove them from the pot, then in the remaining oil (add a bit more if there doesn't seem enough) add flour to form a roux. Cook the roux until it's lightly browned, then lower the heat, pour in the chicken broth, water with boullion if you need more broth (or additional chicken stock, but the water/boullion is cheaper), plus the heavy cream and half&half.*
Add the sausage, leeks, potatoes, and pepper and bring to a slow simmer and cook until the potatoes are done and the broth is nice and bubbly and thick. Cooking time will vary depending on how large or small you cut your potatoes, but I'd allow about 20 minutes, checking the potatoes' doneness with a fork every few minutes toward the end.
Serve with some good bread and voila, a nice hearty soup.
*Note about cooking with milk: if you use full fat cream or half&half, curdling shouldn't be a problem. If you're wanting to make a more healthy version of this soup and are using 2%, 1% or skim milk, you must temper the milk first. Put the milk in a separate bowl, heat the chicken broth to just below simmering, then slowly add ladles of the warm broth to the cold milk to bring it up to temperature gradually before adding it all back into the soup pot. Also, you'll have to cook the soup longer and at a lower temperature. I honestly have such mixed results even with tempering skim or low fat milk that I've decided I'd rather fix a full-fat soup and eat a little less of it, making sure that day I eat light at other meals. If you're concerned about even full-fat milk/cream curdling, you can temper it like you'd do with skim. I haven't found that necessary, though, so long as I add it into the soup along with the broth and let it all come up to a simmer gradually.)
That's the last of January and the last of the Q's to A. :D Thanks for such good questions, y'all! It's been fun.
layne67 Your favourite dish ever and its recipe :)Hmmm... I've been thinking about this for over a month now and I'm not entirely sure what to choose. So many of my meals these days are very simple--some fish and veggies or chicken and veggies, or something that's not really something that has a "recipe" so much as "assemble on a plate". LOL
But I do make a few dishes that are more involved, the best of which are usually soups, so here's one of my family's favorites. Not sure how many, if any, of the ingredients are available in your country, Layne, but you can substitute ingredients based on what you have on hand--this is, if nothing else, a base recipe for creamy soup that can be altered to suit your tastes. Bear in mind the amounts are only approximate because I'm very much a "put in however much I think it needs" kind of cook. Also, measurements are old school American but no worries because none of this needs to be especially precise, which is the nice thing about soup and probably why I make it so often. I've added in links to images of the products I use.
Sausage, potato & leek soup
1 package of breakfast link sausage, cut up in 1/2 inch slices
1 large leek, white portion only sliced into thin disks and thoroughly washed (to clean leeks, after I've cut it, I separate it into little rings and immerse them in the bowl of my salad spinner, then I run them through rinse/drain/spin twice, just to be sure the grit is all gone). If you don't have leeks in your area, you can use a mild yellow onion or shallots.
Olive oil, enough to cook the sausage and leeks, about 2 tablespoons
1 tablespoon flour (optional)
4-5 medium potatoes, peeled and diced
2 cans of chicken broth
1 cup of heavy cream
1 cup of half & half (which is half milk/half cream)
Water & chicken boullion if needed (I use McCormick Chicken Base, which is a sort of paste form of boullion that tastes far better than traditional bouillion cubes. It can be hard to find, though, so use whatever you have available)
Ground black pepper to taste
Heat up a large soup pot, preferably one with a good thick bottom, over medium heat. Add olive oil and when it starts to shimmer, toss in the sausage. When the sausage is about halfway done, toss in the leeks so they can soften up. Here's the optional bit: personally, I don't do this step because I think the starch from the potatoes thickens the broth sufficiently, but if you like a really thick soup, once the sausage and leeks are done, remove them from the pot, then in the remaining oil (add a bit more if there doesn't seem enough) add flour to form a roux. Cook the roux until it's lightly browned, then lower the heat, pour in the chicken broth, water with boullion if you need more broth (or additional chicken stock, but the water/boullion is cheaper), plus the heavy cream and half&half.*
Add the sausage, leeks, potatoes, and pepper and bring to a slow simmer and cook until the potatoes are done and the broth is nice and bubbly and thick. Cooking time will vary depending on how large or small you cut your potatoes, but I'd allow about 20 minutes, checking the potatoes' doneness with a fork every few minutes toward the end.
Serve with some good bread and voila, a nice hearty soup.
*Note about cooking with milk: if you use full fat cream or half&half, curdling shouldn't be a problem. If you're wanting to make a more healthy version of this soup and are using 2%, 1% or skim milk, you must temper the milk first. Put the milk in a separate bowl, heat the chicken broth to just below simmering, then slowly add ladles of the warm broth to the cold milk to bring it up to temperature gradually before adding it all back into the soup pot. Also, you'll have to cook the soup longer and at a lower temperature. I honestly have such mixed results even with tempering skim or low fat milk that I've decided I'd rather fix a full-fat soup and eat a little less of it, making sure that day I eat light at other meals. If you're concerned about even full-fat milk/cream curdling, you can temper it like you'd do with skim. I haven't found that necessary, though, so long as I add it into the soup along with the broth and let it all come up to a simmer gradually.)
That's the last of January and the last of the Q's to A. :D Thanks for such good questions, y'all! It's been fun.
