Broccoli Cheese Soup

* We linked this post at Fight Back Friday at Food Renegade  and Monday Mania at the Healthy Home Economist *

Earlier this month I posted a broccoli soup that I liked, but it  lacked the cheesy creaminess that you might expect when ordering broccoli soup at a restaurant.  The common household method (and probably at most restaurants too) of making a broccoli cheese soup is to use a block of Velveeta-- a far cry from "real" cheese.  This recipe, uses all real ingredients, and resulted in a wonderfully smooth and cheesy goodness that even a toddler should have a hard time turning down.  In this recipe you also get to learrn fancy terms like roux, bechamel, and mornay. 

Teriyaki Ahi Tuna Steak with Miso Soup

* We linked this post at Real Food Wednesday at Kelly the Kitchen Kop *

We try to get at least one serving of fish in every week here for the purported health benefits, and because I love fish.  Ahi tuna is one of my favorites, and I recently found some that claims to be sustainably wild harvested, so I thought that was a great match.  I also found some organic soy sauce and miso at my local health food store.  When you have a setup like that, the only possible option is some teriyaki grilled fish steaks and miso soup.

Menu for 03/06/2011 - Split Pea & Barley Soup with Sourdough Sesame Crackers (Dude1)

I guess I was in the mood for yet another 'green' soup.  My green colored vegetable of choice this time was split peas.  This soup was inspired by the split pea soup at California Pizza Kitchen.  I have fond memories of CPK back when I was living in Monterey CA.  Who has time to cook when you're working on a Master's thesis? The barley in this makes it extra hardy and easy to get full with.  I served it with some homemade sourdough sesame crackers.   The added excitement of the night while making this was an explosive mishap with the blender.... green goo everywhere!

Menu for 03/04/2011 - Broccoli Soup with Sourdough Garlic Croutons

Tonight I needed a meal that was quick and easy because I had to work late.  I have also been feeling like we have not been eating enough vegetables lately.  Broccoli soup seemed to meet the criteria very well.  I've adapted a soup by Jules over at Stonesoup.  What intrigued me about her post, was her method of making a flavorful soup when  you don't have stock.  Now, I did happen to have homemade chicken stock, but I wanted to try out her method to see how it compared.  To make this magic work, I caramelized onions, and added soy sauce and a touch of lemon juice.  Also, to sell this soup to my wife and child I knew I was going to have to add something extra  yummy to top it off.  I chose homemade sourdough garlic and parmesan croutons.

Dude2 -- Dinner in 20 Minutes Flat (2/23/2011)

I had to work late today, so I ended up only having about 20 minutes to get something made for dinner. Time to improvise! On the drive home, cream of spinach soup sounded pretty good, so I went for it. I'm sure I have recipes in some of my cookbooks for this, but they are all currently packed so I had to wing it. I'd say it came out pretty good, but it could have been a bit thicker. If you try it, maybe cut down on the stock by about a cup, or add extra spinach.

Menu for 02/16/2011 - Minestrone Soup (Dude1)

I'm falling behind on getting my dinner menus posted and Dude 2 has also stepped up the game by adding photos. I'll be sure to start adding photos to my future menus.

Dinner the other night was minestrone soup. This is a great meal to load up on veggies! I'll post the ingredient amounts I ended up using, but just a warning that it did end up making enough for a small army. No worries, as this will freeze great since I did not add the noodles directly to the soup.

Menu for 2/17/2011 - French Onion Soup (Dude2)

Tonight, I made French onion soup, gratineed with a whole wheat sourdough crouton and Swedish Fontina cheese. Vegetables arrived in the form of a simple side salad with Ume Plum vinaigrette. I modded the French onion soup recipe according to my own tastes, and the result was awesome if you ask me.