Fridge Soup

Pin It After a day out, I don't feel much like cooking. So, in an attempt to simplify my cooking experience, I pretty much just threw everything from the fridge into a pot and called it soup! Fortunately, it turned out well :) This particular day had a beautiful variety of brightly colored veggies, but I'm pretty sure that if you throw most any veggies in a pot with broth and simmer, it will taste good. Oh, and I'm not sure if you know this about me, but I believe in butter. And cream. YUM! So, of course, both of those are included in this recipe. I suppose you could leave them out, but what fun would that be?? After the picture, the recipe.

Look at those beautiful veggies! There's a bit of steam blowing up, giving the picture a sort of ethereal feel :)

Fridge Soup

Ingredients:

1 Cup each of your favorite veggies, or whatever is in the fridge (I used red cabbage, carrots, celery, leeks, zucchini, and [1/2 cup] green onion)

5 cups strong broth or stock (chicken, beef, or veggie. Again, the idea is to use what you have)

1/2 - 3/4 Cup heavy cream (or half and half, regular milk, evaporated milk, soy milk)

3 Tbsp butter (or olive oil, vegetable oil) for sauteing the veggies (I used half butter, half olive oil)

2 Bay leaves

Salt and pepper

Any other seasonings you like!

Preparation:

Get the broth on to boil. Saute any vegetable you would like to saute (I usually saute everything, it cooks faster that way). Add veggies to pot, along with bay leaves, salt and pepper (and any other seasoning you are using). Simmer for a while (an hour or two, just use whatever time you have available). Remove the bay leaves and add the cream just before serving. 

Fantastic served with crusty bread on a cold day!

Indonesian Beef Stew

Pin It This is a wonderful crock-pot stew that I found in my Williams-Sonoma Slow Cooker Cookbook. The original recipe can be found here. I couldn't find unsweetened coconut at my local grocery store, so I used sweetened and omitted the brown sugar. Cumin and Coriander are not spices I had used before, so I had to purchase them. I was able to find smaller jars for less than $3 at Target. I figured I wasn't sure if I would use them frequently, so that was a small price to pay to try something new! As I was making this, I was thinking that this stew would be equally good (and cheaper) if I used chicken breast instead. Just a thought. Without further ado, here is the recipe!

Indonesian Beef Stew

Ingredients:

1/4 cup canola oil
3 lb. boneless beef chuck, cut into 2-inch cubes (I used the pre-cut "beef for stew" found in the meat section of the grocery)
1 yellow onion, chopped
2 cups unsweetened shredded or flaked dried coconut (I used sweetened)
1 Tbs. firmly packed light brown sugar (I omitted this because of the sweetened coconut)
1 Tbs. ground coriander
1 1/2 tsp. ground cumin
1 tsp. salt, plus more, to taste
1 tsp. freshly ground pepper, plus more, to taste
4 cups coconut milk
Steamed white rice for serving

Preparation:

In a large fry pan over medium-high heat, warm the oil. Add the beef and onion and cook, stirring frequently, until the meat is no longer red and the onion has softened, about 4 minutes. Sprinkle with the coconut, brown sugar (if using), coriander, cumin, the 1 tsp. salt and the 1 tsp. pepper. Continue sautéing until the meat and coconut are browned and the spices are fragrant, 5 to 7 minutes more. Transfer the mixture to a slow cooker.

Add the coconut milk to the fry pan, increase the heat to high and deglaze the pan, stirring to scrape up the browned bits from the pan bottom. Bring the coconut milk to a boil, then pour it into the slow cooker. Cover and cook on high for 4 hours or on low for 8 hours according to the manufacturer’s instructions.

Adjust the seasonings with salt and pepper. Ladle the stew over steamed rice and serve immediately. Serves 6 to 8.

Adapted from Williams-Sonoma Food Made Fast Series, Slow Cooker, by Norman Kolpas (Oxmoor House, 2007).