After a weekend of parties, movies, and a trip to Teddy Roosevelt’s house in Oyster Bay, I spent Monday winding things down and preparing for the week. As I was cleaning items out of the refrigerator in the morning, I discovered that I had a pound of unused carrots on the bottom shelf. I turned to the New York Times’ Recipes for Health, where recipes are broken down by main ingredient and, as the title of the website section suggests, they’re good for you.

A pureed carrot soup looked like a perfect option. I had most of the ingredients on hand, and other than peeling and chopping two pounds of carrots, preparation was simple. You can find the recipe here and some photos from my adventure after the jump.

Make sure to leave ample time for peeling and chopping, or employ the help of a friend or significant other. This soup can be a team effort.

After sauteing my onion and carrots, I added vegetable broth instead of water. I think it added a lot of flavor, but if I were to make it again, I would go low-sodium.

Once the soup simmers for thirty minutes, you’ll be able to see how the addition of the abborio rice helps to thicken the broth. Here’s the soup pre-hand blender.

You can use a hand blender, regular blender, or food mill to puree the soup, but the hand blender comes highly recommended. It’s so easy to use and dishwasher safe (most of the time). It took the soup from from chunky to potage in about fifteen seconds.

To complete my meal, I made an SAT: sprout, avocado, and tomato sandwich. Overall, a healthy, vegetable-filled dinner for one (with plenty of leftover soup for freezing).

I did some dumpling-related freelance writing recently and was left with an abundance of the pork and mushroom variety when I was done. After enjoying a dozen dipped in soy sauce, I decided to make a simple dumpling soup with shiitake mushrooms, cabbage, and scallions. This is a perfect meal to make if you have leftover dumplings that you’ve made yourself or that you have in the fridge from your most recent Chinese food delivery. The best part is that it only takes fifteen minutes to make.

Leftover Dumpling Soup
-6 cups chicken or vegetable broth
-2 tbs. scallions, thinly sliced
-1/3 cup thin carrot slices
-3 shiitake mushrooms, sliced into 1/2″ strips
-1/2 cup Napa cabbage, cut into thin strips
-1/2 tsp. sesame oil
-2 tsp. soy sauce
-Salt and pepper to taste
-12 steamed or boiled dumplings

1) Pour broth into a large pot and add carrot slices, scallions, sesame oil, and soy sauce. Just as it reaches a simmer, add mushrooms and cabbage.

2) Once the broth reaches a boil, add the dumplings. Cook 5-6 minutes or until the dumplings are heated through. Try the broth, add salt and pepper to taste, and serve.

I’ve spent the past two Sundays making variations on Alice Waters’ Minestrone Soup, outlined in her invaluable book The Art of Simple Food. It’s a straightforward recipe that gives you the freedom to improvise based on what’s available at the farmers’ market that day. Making soup from scratch also serves as a wonderful escape on a cold Sunday afternoon. Putting on headphones and catching up on podcasts while cutting vegetables lets you forget about impending elections and financial chaos for a little while.

The beginning of any variation on this minestrone soup is a soffritto of 2 chopped carrots and a large onion, cooked in a heavy pan with a 2 tablespoons of olive oil until tender. Throw in a few chopped cloves of garlic, thyme, salt, and any other seasonings you need, and you’ve got the base for your broth. 

Once you add about three cups of water, vegetables are added in an order to allow enough time for them to cook. Chopped potatoes typically need 15 minutes or so, while softer vegetables need only a few minutes. Last Sunday, I used sage, potatoes, kale, chopped tomatoes, and cooked beans, while this Sunday I used celery, potatoes, turnips, and cooked whole wheat orzo. I think this Sunday’s soup was more successful, however I still haven’t quite gotten the broth to vegetable ratio quite right (as you can see from the photo at the top of this post). What I do know is that cutting up all of the vegetables before starting the soup makes everything much easier.

One of the best parts of making soup on Sunday is being able to store it for lunch throughout the week, or at least the first few days. Pair it with a fresh loaf of bread and you’ve got a meal to get you through the work day.