Ham and Green Bean Soup

An excellent recipe for using leftover ham.  This is a classic soup recipe from my youth.  It conjures warm, cozy memories.  As far as I'm concerned this soup must be served with a peanut butter and jelly sandwich because that's the way we always ate it.  You don't have to but that makes it super special in my book.

Ham and Green Beans


3-4 Lb Bone-In Ham
1-2 Lb Green Beans, Trimmed
3 - 4 Pounds Small Potatoes
Salt And Pepper


In a large stock pot, cover the ham with water. Boil for 1 1/2 - 2 hours. Add extra water to cover as needed.

Cut the potatoes in half or quarters.  I used a combination of new potatoes and Yukon gold.

Remove the ham from the pot.  Add the potatoes and green beans to the broth and cook for 20-30 minutes or until potatoes are tender. 

Cut or shred the meat while the potatoes and beans cook.

Add the meat back to the pot and heat until warmed through. Add salt and pepper to the broth to taste.  

Let simmer until ready to serve.

Caramelized Three Onion Bisque

Caramelized Three Onion Bisque

2 Tablespoons Olive Oil

2 Tablespoons Unsalted Butter

2 Large Heads Garlic Cloves, Peeled

4 Medium Vidalia Onions, Thinly Sliced

3 Large Shallots, Sliced

6 Green Onions, Chopped

1 Russet Potato, Peeled And Sliced

3 Tablespoons Sherry Vinegar

1 Tablespoon Chopped Fresh Rosemary

6 Cups Chicken Broth

1/2 Cup Heavy Cream

Fresh Ground Pepper

Melt oil and butter in a soup pot over moderately low heat. Add garlic and cook, stirring occasionally, 10 to 12 minutes. Cook slow to allow garlic to caramelize.

Add onions and shallots and cook, stirring frequently, until onions are softened, about 10 minutes. 

Stir in potato, vinegar, and rosemary. 

Increase heat to high and sauté, stirring, for 2 minutes. 




Add broth and bring to a boil, then simmer, uncovered, until vegetables are very soft, 20 to 25 minutes.

Allow soup to cool enough that you can stick a finger in it an not get burned. 

Purée soup in 2 or 3 batches in blender until very smooth. 

Pour back into pan and heat to a high simmer over medium heat.

Stir in cream season with salt and pepper. Serve hot.

I served with crusty bread and grilled jalapeno-mango chicken sausage.

Print Recipe

The sound of my voice

Have you ever noticed that the way your voice sounds to you when you speak as opposed to the way it sounds in a recording is so different?  I mean, when anyone else talks it sounds the same whether I hear it live or via a recording or over the phone.  What's up with that?

The reason for this is because when you hear your own voice when your talking you're hearing it a combination of two ways . . . your hearing the sound as it travels directly through your head and also as it travels through the air into your ear.





When you hear a recording of your voice you're only hearing it via airwaves . . . just like everyone else's voice you hear.    





This is why your own voice sounds strange when played back from a recording.  By the way . . . I like my voice much better in my head.

Sausage Cabbage Soup

1 Can of Chicken Broth

1 Lb. Bulk Sausage, Browned

3 Strips Bacon, Cooked

1/2 Head of Cabbage - Chopped

3 Large Carrots - Chopped

8 Stalks of Celery

1 Can Chopped Tomatoes

1 Can of Sliced Mushrooms

1 Pkg of Lipton Onion Soup Mix

12 Oz Can of V-8 Juice

 

Chop all veggies into bite size pieces. Drain and rinse canned mushrooms. 


Brown sausage in a large pot.  Add all remaining ingredients to the pot - bring to a boil then cook on low for an hour then on low for 3 hours. Low calorie and very filling.

Kids will be kids

During a recent visit to New Hampshire we were enjoying breakfast at one of our favorite eateries in North Conway. Peaches is a small restaurant with limited seating, so if people are there with a large party it’s very likely they will be split up into separate tables.  

Such was the case during this visit  . . . seated nearby was a family with six people at one table and three children at another.  The children . . . two little girls and a boy . . . were seated right next to our table.  The adults at the other table were eating their meals and involved in their conversation and not overly paying attention to the kids.  The kids were generally behaving themselves but were goofing around a little.  The girls had each taken a packet of sugar substitute and poured it into a pile next to their plates, where the grown ups wouldn’t see.  They were dipping their fingers in the sugar substitute and licking it off . . . why they weren’t snarfng real sugar, I have no idea.  They kept doing this . . . giggling quietly . . . pulling one over on the 
old folks.  It was kind of cute.

It was especially amusing to me because I remember doing the same thing when I was young and us kids were sequestered at a separate table while the grown up sat off on their own drinking their coffee and conversing about grown up things . . . except it wasn’t sugar packets and it wasn’t quite as innocuous. 

We used to practice our spoon bending prowess.  If we happened to break a spoon we’d have to dispose of the evidence . . . often by slipping the stem of the spoon into the ketchup bottle and the bowl end in the napkin dispenser.  Yeah were wire minor . . . very minor . . . magicians.  Troublesome punks is what we really were.

Sometimes we'd get to wait in the car.  We’d hang out goofing off, gossip and huff matchsticks.  That’s right . . . I said it . . . we inhaled white phosphorous from the igniting match.  Dude!  It was cool!  When the white phosphorus reaches your lungs it absorbs the moisture there and converts it into what looks like smoke when it is exhaled.  
Not exactly healthy for us . . . but totally awesome.  What can I say . . . it doesn’t take much to impress a bunch of 14 year olds.   


The funny thing is,  I don’t ever remember my mom commenting on the smell of burnt matches in the car . . . what’s up with that?

The moral . . . adults are clueless.    Oh wait!  I am one.  :P

44-Clove Garlic Soup With Parmesan Cheese

Sweet mother of the garlic gods this soup is fantasmically delicious!

26 Garlic Cloves (Unpeeled)

2 Tablespoons Olive Oil

2 Tablespoons (1/4 Stick) Butter

2 1/4 Cups Sliced Onions

1 1/2 Teaspoons Chopped Fresh Thyme

18 Garlic Cloves, Peeled

3 1/2 Cups Chicken Stock Or Canned Low-Salt Chicken Broth

1/2 Cup Whipping Cream

1 Cup Finely Grated Parmesan Cheese (About 4 Ounces)

4 Lemon Wedges

Roast the garlic.  Preheat oven to 350°F. Place 26 garlic cloves in small glass baking dish. Add 2 tablespoons olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper; toss to coat. Cover baking dish tightly with foil and bake until garlic is golden brown and tender, about 45 minutes. Or use this method for the crockpot.  


Cool. Squeeze garlic between fingertips to release cloves. Transfer cloves to small bowl.

Melt butter in heavy large saucepan over medium-high heat. Add onions and thyme and cook until onions are translucent, about 6 minutes. Add roasted garlic and 18 raw garlic cloves and cook 3 minutes. Add chicken stock; cover and simmer until garlic is very tender, about 20 minutes. 

Let soup cool.  Working in batches, puree soup in blender until smooth. Return soup to saucepan; add cream and bring to simmer. Season with salt and pepper.

Divide grated cheese among 4 bowls and ladle soup over. Squeeze juice of 1 lemon wedge into each bowl and serve.

Note: Can be prepared 1 day ahead. Cover and refrigerate. Rewarm over medium heat, stirring occasionally.

We'll leave the light on for you . . . or not

When I was kid we didn't travel much.  Our vacations were either camping trips or staying with family members.


So, when the rare occasion arose where we would be staying at a motel/hotel it was a really REALLY big deal . . . an adventure, a luxury.

Mind you, we didn't stay a 4 or 5 star hotels.  Holiday Inn was as top of the line as we went and Comfort Inn was the norm.  It didn't matter . . . Cable television! Game room!  Swimming Pool! HOT TUB!  It doesn't sound like it should be that exciting, I know.  But trust me it was.  


Come to think of it, coming across the scrambled adult television channel may  have been my first experience with pornography . . . oh joy.

Anyhoo . . . as fun and wonderful as it all was it didn't make us (the kids) angelic guests.  For the most part we behaved ourselves but all that excitement seemed to have brought some prankishness to the surface.

Besides the typical swiping of the towels, soaps and whatnot . . . we dare not touch the minibar or Mom would open a can of whoop-ass on us . . . we had fun roaming the hallways and making a general nuisance of ourselves.  

Of course, there was the ever popular knock-and-run game.  But, that wears a little thin after a while . . . especially, as we got older.  One thing that never seemed to grow old no matter how often we did it was when we found the mini-moos and condiment packets left outside of random doors for room service to retrieve.  


What's so fun about that?  Well, what we did was stomp on them.  The contents . . . whether it was milk, ketchup, mustard or mayo . . . would squirt all over the walls and carpeting.  

;;

The bigger the spatter, the higher splat the more points.  We didn't have and actually scoring structure established and we didn't keep tally . . . it was more on a case by case basis . . . or smoosh but smoosh, as it were.


Yeah . . . we were hicks, we were lame but we had fun.

Ukrainian Red Borscht Soup

1 (16 Ounce) Package Pork Sausage

3 Medium Beets, Peeled And Shredded

3 Carrots, Peeled And Shredded

3 Medium Baking Potatoes, Peeled And Cubed

1 Tablespoon Vegetable Oil

1 Medium Onion, Chopped

1 (6 Ounce) Can Tomato Paste

3/4 Cup Water

1/2 Medium Head Cabbage, Cored And Shredded

1 (8 Ounce) Can Diced Tomatoes, Drained

3 Cloves Garlic, Minced

Salt And Pepper To Taste

1 Teaspoon White Sugar, Or To Taste

1/2 Cup Sour Cream, For Topping

Crumble the sausage into a skillet over medium-high heat. Cook and stir until no longer pink. Remove from the heat and put in large soup pot.

Fill the pot halfway with water (about 2 quarts), and bring to a boil.

Add the beets, carrots and potatoes, and cook until tender, about 15 minutes. Add the cabbage, and the can of diced tomatoes.

Heat the oil in a skillet over medium heat. Add the onion, and cook until tender. Stir in the tomato paste and water until well blended. Transfer to the pot.

Add the raw garlic to the soup, cover and turn off the heat. Let stand for 5 minutes. Taste, and season with salt, pepper and sugar.

Ladle into serving bowls, and garnish with sour cream and fresh parsley.

Continuous effort is the key to unlocking our potential

“The term “latchkey kid” refers to unsupervised youngsters who care for themselves before or after school, on weekends, and during holidays while their parents work. They commonly carry house keys to let themselves in and out of their homes.”

I was a latchkey kid.   I had a single working mother who didn’t get home for hours after I got home from school; leaving me to fend for myself much of the time.  I learned at a relatively young age to take care of myself.  Being forced, as a young kid, to have responsibilities and be responsible for myself wasn’t necessarily a bad thing.  I did my own laundry, made most of my own meals and did chores around the house . . . all unsupervised.  I may have been bored at times but I don’t ever remember being lonely.  I could very well amuse myself . . . and this was well before computers and video games, too.  Amazing, huh?

One thing I did more often than I care to admit was to forget or misplace my house key.  Keep in mind that I lived in a very rural part of Pennsylvania, which means that going to a friend’s house until my mom got home wasn’t a viable alternative.  This was also before cell phones.  So that meant that I had to find a way into the house or be stuck outside for hours.  I was a little kid not a mailman, so I didn’t do the rain or snow or dark of night thing. 

You’d think I would have thought to hide the key somewhere on the property . . . that would have been the smart thing to do.  We lived on over an acre of land on the top of a mountain . . . there was no shortage of places to stash a key.  

Too often, I’d get off the school bus and realize that I didn’t have my key.  If I was lucky someone would have forgotten to lock a door or a window and I would be able to get inside . . . no fuss, no muss.  I was unlucky more often than not.  Somehow I figured out that if I jiggled one of the basement windows the latch on the lock would eventually disengage and I’d be able to open the window and slide in.  That’s how I usually got in.  There was one time that the lock wouldn’t budge . . . no matter how hard I tried.  I remember it was cold and raining that day so staying outside wasn’t an option.  I had to get inside.  I started to panic and began to push on the window with my feet . . . it didn’t occur to me that I’d probably break the glass . . . which, of course, is exactly what happened.  

I unlocked the window from the outside and slid inside onto the glass strewn workbench that was under the window.    I didn't know what to do, but one thing I wasn't about to do was tell my mom.  I would have been punished for forgetting my key . . . again . . . and I probably would have gotten a spanking for breaking the window.  So, with a great sense of self preservation, I didn't tell.  It was easily several months later . . . well into the summer . . . before she noticed.  She never suspected me and I’m pretty sure this is the first I've ever spoken of it.  Thankfully, she doesn't read my blog . . . I think she still might give me a spanking if she found out.

~~~

Beef Pot Pie







I use this soup recipe as a base for my stew. After I package and freeze most of the soup, I add a tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce and peas.

To thicken the broth: make a slurry of cold water and flour – 1 cup water to 2 tbsp four. Stir in the slurry and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to a simmer until thickened.


Prepare your pie crust using the recipe below.


Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).

Line a 9 inch pie plate with one of the pie crusts. 

Place the beef mixture into the pie crust and then cover with the other pie crust. 

Bake in a preheated oven until the crust is golden brown; about 45 minutes. Let cool for 5 minutes before serving.












Perfect Pie Crust


2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, plus extra for rolling
1 cup unsalted butter, very-cold, cut into 1/2 inch cubes
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
6 to 8 Tbsp ice water


Combine flour, salt, and sugar in a mixing bowl; stir to mix. Add butter and mix until mixture resembles coarse meal, with pea size pieces of butter. Add ice water 1 Tbsp at a time, mixing until mixture just begins to clump together. If you pinch some of the crumbly dough and it holds together, it's ready. If the dough doesn't hold together, add a little more water and mix again.


Remove dough from the bowl and place in a mound on a clean surface. Gently shape into 2 discs. Knead the dough just enough to form the discs, do not over-knead. You should be able to see little bits of butter in the dough. These small chunks of butter are what will allow the resulting crust to be flaky. Sprinkle a little flour around the discs. Wrap each disc in plastic wrap and refrigerate at least 1 hour, and up to 2 days.


Remove one crust disk from the refrigerator. Let sit at room temperature for 5-10 minutes in order to soften just enough to make rolling out a bit easier. Roll out with a rolling pin on a lightly floured surface to a 12-inch circle; about 1/8 of an inch thick. As you roll out the dough, check if the dough is sticking to the surface below. If necessary, add a few sprinkles of flour under the dough to keep the dough from sticking. Carefully place onto a 9-inch pie plate. Gently press the pie dough down so that it lines the bottom and sides of the pie plate. Use a pair of kitchen scissors to trim the dough to within 1/2 inch of the edge of the pie dish.

I can sympathize with everything, except suffering

I was an unsympathetic child.  If a playmate skinned a knee, I would giggle.  If a friend bumped their head, I would chuckle.  If they fell off a swing, I would snicker.  The worse the pain the harder I would laugh.  I couldn’t help it.  I don’t know why but I thought it was funny when other people got hurt.   Pretty f^cked up, huh?

Yeah, it was. 

Then one day I fell down and landed on a rock.  Bone was busting through my skin and blood was spurting everywhere.  No, not really but that’s what it felt like.  I was crying and hollering out my pain.   And standing over me was my bestest friend in the whole wide world . . . and she was laughing . . . laughing and pointing . . . laughing and pointing at ME!!  I cried harder and she laughed harder.  Then I just got mad . . . it was a long time ago but I remember exactly how I felt.  I yelled at her . . . why was she laughing when I was hurt?  That was just mean.   She looked at me and said, “well, now you know what it feels like.”

Lesson learned.  

Compassion understood.  

Sympathy acquired.

The Flies and the Honey-Pot 

A number of Flies were attracted to a jar of honey which had been overturned in a housekeeper's room, and placing their feet in it, ate greedily. Their feet, however, became so smeared with the honey that they could not use their wings, nor release themselves, and were suffocated. Just as they were expiring, they exclaimed, "O foolish creatures that we are, for the sake of a little pleasure we have destroyed ourselves." 

Pleasure bought with pains, hurts. 






Pasta E Fagioli with Italian Sausage  (A Crockpot Recipe)

1 Tablespoon Olive Oil

1 Onions, Chopped

2 Cloves Garlic, Finely Chopped

1 Carrots, Peeled & Chopped

1 Stalk Celery, Chopped

1 Lb Hot or Sweet Bulk Italian Sausage

2 Teaspoons Dry Oregano

1 Tablespoon Dry Basil

1 -2 Teaspoon Red Pepper Flakes, To Taste

1 1/2 Cups Canned Chopped Tomatoes With Juice

3 -4 Cups Chicken Stock

2 Can Cannellini Beans With Juice

1 Lb Cup Ditalini, cooked according to package directions

Heat olive oil in a large heavy pot over medium high heat.  Cook onion in oil 2 minutes. Stir in garlic, celery and carrots and cook for 3 minutes. 

Add and brown crumbled sausage.

Add mixture to crock pot and stir in basil, oregano, red pepper and tomatoes.

Stir in beans and stock.

Cook on low for 6 hours or on high for 4 hours.

Serve over pasta. Top with grated parmesan cheese.

Note:  I undercook the pasta then add it and add the soup to containers and freeze for lunches.  That way the pasta is not overcooked.