Oh my God. This soup is like a religious experience.
I’m primarily a baker, but given that I’m technically not supposed to eat cake for dinner – yeah, I don’t get it either – I cook other foods too, and this time of year, its often soup, because nothing’s better than soup when it’s so cold and windy out that the snow is falling sideways. I only wish I was joking, people. It was bad yesterday. It was definitively a Soup Day
I still had most of a 5 lb bag of russets, so I made it a Potato Soup day.
This is the kind of recipe that supports a lot of experimentation. The basics are very basic – potatoes, onion, garlic, and stock – and a lot of changes can be made to change up the taste. Mine is seasoned with mustard powder, nutmeg, salt and seasoned pepper, and gets a lot of its flavor from the bacon fat I sauteed the vegetables in. You can just as easily use butter or olive oil, and season with Italian herbs or with dill or celery seed for a different flavor entirely.
Personally, I’m not going to change this one up much more; I nearly moaned when I ate my first bite last night.
The Best Motherfucking Baked Potato Soup Ever
6 medium russet potatoes, peeled and diced
1 Spanish onion, chopped
2 cloves of garlic, minced
5 slices of thick-cut bacon, chopped
4 C chicken stock
4 oz soft goat cheese or goat cream cheese
1/4 C half and half
1/4 C AP flour
1/2 t dried mustard
1/4 t nutmeg
1/4 t sea salt
1/4 t California Seasoned Pepper
Chop bacon into half-inch pieces using kitchen scissors and render in a large pot. Remove bacon when crisp, draining on a towel, and saute onion until tender but not brown in the bacon fat. Add garlic and cook for 30 seconds or until fragrant.
Add flour and whisk until the flour is completely combined and the mixture is thick and bubbly. Add mustard and nutmeg and stir to combine.
Add diced potatoes and stir to coat. Season with salt and pepper. Pour in chicken stock and cook, covered, until very tender. It took around twenty minutes for mine, with a fairly small dice, but may take longer with larger pieces of potato.
Mash potatoes with a potato masher until the soup is thick and there are no large pieces remaining. Add goat cheese/goat cream cheese and whisk until melted. Add half-and-half, and stir to combine.
Add reserved bacon and stir to combine. Serve hot.
It’s an easy recipe, but unbelievably delicious, and perfect for an easy supper on a cold night; given that it’s just as cold today, I suspect I’ll be eating it again.
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This was originally supposed to be Chocolate Spice Bread from Nick Maligieri’s The Modern Baker, but I was, um. Out of sour cream. And then I accidentally added twice as much cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg. And had to add an extra egg. And substituted goat cheese for the sour cream.
In other words, this is not Nick’s chocolate spice bread, but it is one of the most decadent chocolate desserts I’ve made, and that includes the afternoon I spent getting drunk on chocolate bourbon cake.
Chocolate Spice Cake Loaf
1 1/2 C AP flour
1/3 C dutch process cocoa powder
1 t baking powder
1/2 t salt
1 t cinnamon
1 t nutmeg
1 t ground ginger
3 eggs
1/2 C granulated sugar
1/2 C brown sugar
5 T melted butter
4 oz goat cheese, softened
1 t almond extract
Sift together flour, cocoa, baking powder, spices and salt. Set aside.
Whisk eggs with sugar. Add melted butter, goat cheese, and almond extract and beat until smooth. Add dry ingredients and beat until combined.
Spread in a greased loaf pan and bake in a 350F oven for 40-50 minutes or until a clean knife inserted into the center comes out clean. Let cool in the pan for five minutes, then remove and cool completely before serving.
I figured that yet another recipe full of substitutions and minor errors was the right way to end the year. It is, after all, the way I bake 90% of my recipes.
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These are a few of my favorite things other than cake: Mushrooms. Butter. Wine. Goat Cheese. Garlic. And these mushrooms hit all of them, and turned out marginally better than the roasted acorn squash. I’d almost take a picture, except for a couple minor things – the photograph embargo on this blog, and the fact that there are only three left.
I live alone. That should tell you how good they are.
They’re also ridiculously simple, nothing more than mushroom caps, sauteed in butter and then stuffed with plain goat cheese, and then topped with parsley, green onions, and garlic cooked in the remainder of the butter and some white wine. Bake for fifteen minutes, and you’re golden. Inspired by this recipe on The Pioneer Woman Cooks, but I, uh, have had bad experiences with brie.
Goat Cheese Stuffed Mushrooms with Herbs and Garlic
1 14 oz package of mushrooms, washed, stems removed
1 4 oz package of goat cheese
3-4 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 bunch flat-leaf parsley, chopped
4 green onions, sliced thin
1/4 C butter
1 generous splash white wine.
Preheat oven to 350F. Wash mushrooms and remove stems. Melt butter in a skillet and saute the mushroom caps for approximately five minutes, or until golden. Place in baking dish.
Chop parsley and garlic, slice green onions and dump in the same skillet the mushrooms cooked in. Saute until parsley is wilted and garlic is fragrant. Add wine and cook until evaporated.
Meanwhile, stuff the mushroom caps with goat cheese. I started with a knife, but just use your fingers. Really. You’ll thank me for it.
Top the mushrooms with the parsley mixture and cook for 15-18 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool slightly.
That’s it, really. It looks amazingly complicated, but it’s not. At all.
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