As I write this, it’s summertime, and of course, with the high temperatures, ones’ thoughts turn to…soup.
Well, maybe not.
But I did come home, and with a lack of ingredients, some half-formed idea for a recipe, and a desire to cook, I came up with the following, which I think has such a great flavor, I would not hesitate feeding this to guests (in a soup-appropriate situation, of course).
For this recipe you need a hand-blender, which is easy to use, easy to clean, and a heck of a lot better than the mess caused by a food processor. I have a motto: Cleanup is part of every project. If a recipe is too complicated to cleanup while you are cooking it – I don’t like to do it.
- 1 large red onion
- 1/2 large green pepper
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 3 tablespoons butter
- 3 12oz. cans chicken broth
- 1 ripe avocado
- 8 dashes Tabasco sauce
In a deep pot (very important!), place the cut up onion and green pepper in quarters, at least, and brown in oil and butter. I heard that butter adds great flavor and also increases the smoking point of olive oil (whatever that means), so I tried it. This took about 5 minutes. Add 1 can of broth and the avacado.
Now the tricky part – you want to use the hand blender to partly puree the ingredients. A hand blender has a nasty habit of splashing ingredients all over the place – hence the importance of a deep pot. Here’s what I do: take a paper plate and from the edge, cut a line to the center, then cut a hole in the center for the shaft of the hand blender. Sounds complicated but takes less than 10 seconds. Use this as a cover for the pot and proceed to puree. Don’t totally liquify – you want a few chunks.
Add the other 2 cans of broth, simmer for a minute or two and serve.
this resulted in a creamy soup with a lot of flavor. I will definitely make this one again.
UPDATE: This soup works well chilled – ‘chilled’ sounds better than ‘cold straight out of the fridge’, doesn’t it? Serve it to friends and tell them that the recipe is based on one that was served to Louis XVI of France during a state visit by the Czar of Russia in the 1700’s. This is a total fabrication, but who will know? And it helps you to get rid of some cold soup.
Low Carb Confidential 