Soup – Grow. Cook. Eat.

February 14, 2011

My Favorite Valentine (recipe: Cauliflower-Spinach Vichyssoise)

I’ve never been a fan of Valentine’s Day, with all the red hype and floral expectations.

Perhaps, I’m jaded by the years of working in restaurants. As my old boss used to say, “This one’s for the house.” The night is so busy that we plan menus based on ease and efficiency, not on elegance, creativity or fun. Restaurateurs just want to get to midnight with grace and minimal damage to the restaurants’ reputations for slow service.

Or maybe it’s the high expectations of the “holiday.” I love grocery shopping on Valentine’s Day, watching all the flustered boyfriends: grocery list in one hand, bouquet of flowers in the other. You can see the worry and determination in their eyes to create the most romantic, most delicious meal…

I’m sure I sound like the Grinch at Christmas, but I much prefer the authentic times, the idle Tuesday evenings… when the love and gratitude for our friends and loved ones shows off effortlessly.

Boyfriends have come and gone, and my favorite Valentine’s Days remain the evenings I’ve spent with friends: Sitting by the fireplace with a lovely meal and bottle of wine. And eating ice cream out of the carton for dessert.

Wishing you happiness and love, today and always.

CAULIFLOWER – SPINACH VICHYSSOISE
This soup is terrific served hot or cold.

3 tablespoon Butter
1 shallot — peeled and chopped
½ apple, peeled, cored and diced
1 celery stalk
4 garlic cloves
1 head cauliflower – cored and chopped
2 leek – washed
¼ cup white wine
6 cups water
1 cup spinach
1/4 cup cream (opt.)

Heat a large pot over medium flame. Melt butter. Add shallots, apple, celery, garlic, cauliflower and leeks. Sauté until cauliflower begins to turn limp and brown a little. Deglaze with white wine. Cover vegetables with water, and simmer until soft, about 20 minutes.

Purée soup with cream, and return all but 1 cup to pot. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Purée remaining soup with spinach. Put in a separate pot.

To serve: ladle white vichyssoise into bowl. Ladle green vichyssoise into the center.

That extra loving touch:
Make vanilla oil to garnish soup: Heat ½ cup canola oil with ½ teaspoon curry powder and ½ vanilla bean. Simmer over low heat for 3 minutes. Let sit for 10 minutes.

Soup Photograph: Ellen Callaway. Food Styling: Me.

August 2, 2010

Sweet Corn Chowder

For all the malign commercial corn receives from the sustainable agricultural community, sweet summer corn is literally a whole different beast… and savored for its sweet, crunchy flavor. Sweet corn growers limit their production to varieties meant for eating “unprocessed” – fresh off the cob or frozen. The corn of “Food, Inc infamy”, dent corn, deserves all the flack. The more starchy varieties get processed for corn starch, corn syrup, and animal feed. Dent corn, treated with lye, is used to make masa harina and tortillas.

You can still be a self-respecting sustainable agriculture advocate and enjoy sweet summer corn. I do!

Fresh picked corn needs little adornment, just barely a hint of salt or butter. Its peak flavor is best appreciated with 48 hours of harvesting. After that, the sugars begin converting to starch – even the texture deteriorates.

Recipes abound for corn chowder with all sorts of seasonings and flavors. But when corn is super fresh, I like mine very simple.

Corn Chowder

6 ears corn
2 tbs. butter
1 tbs. chopped garlic
1 small onion, peeled and chopped
¼ cup white wine
3 cups chicken stock
1 cup cream
Salt and pepper to taste
3 small Yukon gold potatoes
2 scallions or one cubanelle pepper, diced

1. Shuck the corn. Cut the corn kernels off the cob. Save the corn cobs.

2. In a large pot, over medium heat, melt 1 tbs. butter. Add ½ the corn, ½ the garlic, and the onion. Let cook for about 3 minutes before stirring. Add the wine, corn cobs and chicken broth. Let simmer for 30 minutes.

3. Meanwhile… cut the potatoes into a medium dice. Toss them with salt and let sit for 5 minutes. Rinse off excess salt.

4. Heat a large skillet over medium high heat. Add remaining butter and potatoes. Cook for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. When potatoes are al dente (timing will depend on how small you cut the potatoes) add the remaining garlic and corn. Season with salt and pepper. Remove from heat and stir in cubanelle peppers and/or scallion.

5. Finish making the corn chowder… fish the cobs out of the broth and scrape all the juice out and back into the pot. Puree the broth in a blender – be careful with the hot liquid – and be sure to take the center plug out of the center of the blender top to let the steam escape.
6. Return the corn stock to the pot and stir in the cream. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
7. Serve the soup with the corn and potato garnish. Top with a dollop of romesco sauce or sun-dried tomato pesto if desired.

June 30, 2010

Scape Goats (Recipe: Tomato Soup with Scape Pesto)

Don't forget about the Equal Exchange Chocolate Give-Away. Leave a comment on this post to enter.

Scape experiments would not be complete without the de-rigueur pesto. And so I pulled out the food processor, olive oil and parmesan.

After the hake and kale, I didn’t have enough scapes left to make a full batch of pesto. But the basil is coming in; it seemed like the perfect marriage – scape-basil pesto! The scapes would replace the garlic in the more traditional version. Honestly, though, my pesto isn’t very traditional… it’s really just an herb oil, as I don’t like nuts. Nonetheless, moving forward…………..

With pesto in mind, I need something to put under it. Tomato soup seemed the perfect foil, especially since I still have plenty of jars left from last summer, and I will be canning this year’s stash in just a few weeks hence.

The flavors of the pesto were pronounced without being overpowering. I could taste the basil, garlic and tomatoes. The scapes had the spicy raw garlic flavor, though it didn’t linger in a way that raw garlic can. And with tomato soup, one must have grilled cheese! And so, I made lunch…

Tomato Soup, Scape-Basil Pesto and Grilled Cheese

Tomato Soup

1 tbs. butter
1 shallot
2 garlic cloves
¼ cup white wine
2 cups stewed tomatoes
1 cup chicken stock or water
Salt and pepper to taste

1. In a soup pot, melt butter over medium-high heat. Add garlic and shallots and cook for 5 mimutes, or until soft. Add wine. Then add tomatoes and stock.

2. Simmer for 10 minutes (longer if using tinned tomatoes). Puree

3. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Scape-Basil “Pesto”

4 scapes
1 handful basil
¼ cup parmesan cheese
¼ cup olive oil
Salt, pepper and lemon juice to taste

1. Combine all ingredients in a few processor. Blend until mostly smooth but a little chunky. Season to taste with salt pepper and lemon juice. Drizzle on top of soup.

Grilled Cheese

4 slices baguette
¼ cup grated cheese
1 tbs. butter

Spread butter on bread. Put bread, butter side down in an oven proof dish. Put cheese on top. Bake at 400 until cheese is melted. Serve with soup and pesto.

I'm submitting this recipe to Andrea's Recipe's "Grow Your Own" Blogging event. Check out her site to see what other folks from the blogosphere are cooking up from their gardens.

March 15, 2010

Crop Rotation (Recipe: Lentils with Spinach and Scallops)

Legumes – things like lentils, peanuts and chickpeas – are plants grown specifically for their seeds. They are also an integral part of crop rotation – a farming practice of planting different crops in one location as a way to replace nitrogen and other nutrients that other crops deplete. This practice minimizes the need for fertilizers and helps ward off insects and fungus.

Plants get nutrients from the soil. And unless we amend the soil, it will degrade every season as plants pull more and more from the soil. Amendments can come in the form of artificial fertilizers and organic compost. We can also add nutrients back by planting particularly nutrient dense crops, such as clover, wheat grass and legumes. Instead of depleting the soil, they add nitrogen and other important nutrients back into the soil… and planting these crops across a tapped area of soil can help it recover, so that future crops will grow better.

For me, lentils are a protein- and nutrient- dense food that is also very economical. They come in a variety of colors and shapes – red, green, brown and the rounder French (green) lentils. The French lentils are better for holding their shape, the red are great for their wonderful color and in soups since they puree easily.

In the past few weeks, a bevy of recipes have popped up on the blogosphere…
Barley Pilaf with Lentils from The Perfect Pantry
Palak Dal from Closet Cooking
Crock-Pot Curried Red Lentils from Eat This.

Last week, I made a variation on Mulligatawny soup from We Are Never Full, and garnished it with seared scallops and spinach.

Mulligatawny Soup
1 tbs. butter
1 onion, peeled and chopped
1 inch piece of ginger, peeled and chopped
4 cloves garlic, peeled, chopped into a few chunks
½ stalk of celery, chopped finely
1 carrot, peeled and chopped
2 tbsp. curry
1/2 cinnamon
2 tsp. ground coriander seed
1 tsp. ground cumin
1 tsp. black pepper
1 can tomatoes
1 1/2 cups of red lentils
6 to 8 cups of chicken stock
Juice of 1 lemon or lime
½ lb. scallops
½ lb. spinach
Sour cream or plain yogurt to garnish

1. Melt butter in a soup pot over medium heat. Add onions, garlic and ginger and sauté until they soften and become fragrant.
2. To the pot, add the spices, carrots and celery. Cook for 1 minute more, just to toast the spices and help them release their flavor.
3. Add the lentils, tomatoes and chicken stock. Bring to a boil over high heat, then reduce the heat to simmer and cook for 30 minutes or until lentils are tender.
4. Meanwhile, season scallops with salt and pepper. Heat a large skillet over high heat. Add a tablespoon of oil. Add the scallops and cook for 2 minutes or until they start to brown. Flip them over and then cook for 2 minutes more. Remove the scallops from the pan.
5. Return the scallop pan to the heat. Wilt spinach. Season with salt and pepper and lemon juice.
6. When lentils are tender, puree in the blender or with an immersion blender. Adjust seasoning with salt pepper and lemon juice. Garnish with scallops and spinach.

December 11, 2009

The Legend of the Macomber Turnip (Recipe: Macomber Turnip Soup with Lobster)

Macomber Turnips are prized for their creamy texture and subtlety balanced sweet-tart flavor. Intuitively, I know they appear on restaurant menus all over New England in the fall. Just for kicks, I Googled, “Macomber Turnip Soup Menu” to see approximately how many restaurants in Boston feature them. Eight out of the ten results on the first page led to a different local restaurant’s menu.

(photo credit: Wendy Maeda, The Boston Globe)

They look like the purple top turnips in shape, size and color gradations. But instead of white with purple shoulders, they are flesh toned with more muted purple shoulders.

According to Cukie Macomber, as written in the New Bedford Standard Times, "It (ed:the macomber turnip)began when two brothers, Adin and Elihu, sixth-generation farmers from the Westport portion of old Dartmouth, began experimenting with seeds. They returned from a fair in Philadelphia in 1876 with seeds for experimentation, planting radishes next to rutabagas (17th century crossbreed of a cabbage and a turnip) to allow cross pollination. The Westport Macomber Turnip was born. Their new turnip inherited the white flesh of the radish parent and turnip grandparent, but an unusual sweetness and horseradish aroma, raw and cooked."

Every year, I see them at Russo’s and think I will buy a few and experiment. Nothing happened until this year. And how glad I am to have discovered them.

As a simple side dish, I roasted them with apples, ginger and garlic.

This dish transformed easily into a soup. With the addition of a little wine and chicken stock I pureed them. I added a little cream to give the soup a little richness. I started to add lemon juice as its part of my usual seasoning routine. But when I tasted the soup it was wonderfully bright without any more seasoning.

This soup can be easily dolled up with a little lobster and/or truffles on top.

Roasted Turnip Base
1 tbs. butter
1 macomber turnip
1 tsp. minced fresh ginger
1 tsp. minced fresh garlic
1 gala apple

1. Preheat the oven to 375.
2. Peel turnip and cut into ¾ inch cubes.
3. Melt the butter in a skillet over medium heat. Add ginger and garlic, and cook for 2 minutes, just to soften.
4. Toss the butter with the turnips. Season with salt and pepper. Spread them in a single layer on a cookie sheet and put them in the oven.
5. Roast t the turnips for 20 minutes.
6. While they’re roasting, core the apple and cut it into a ½ inch dice. Do not peel it.
7. After 20 minutes, add the apple to the turnips. Toss them together to make sure the apples get a little butter coating. Roast for 5 minutes more.
8. Serve as a side dish to braised short ribs or salmon.

Macomber Turnip Soup with Lobster
Turnip Base
1 quart chicken stock/broth
¼ cup heavy cream
1 small leek, white and light green parts, cut and washed.

½ pound lobster meat
1 tsp. fresh tarragon
1 scallion, cut into rings
1 tbs. butter
Lemon

1. In a large soup pot, combine turnip base, chicken stock and leek. Simmer for 20 minutes. Puree in a blender (in two parts if necessary) until smooth. Add cream. Return to pot, and set aside in a warm place.
2. In a medium skillet, melt the butter. Add the lobster and warm it through. Just before serving add tarragon, scallions and a squeeze of lemon.
3. Ladle soup into bowls. Top with lobsters and extra scallion rounds.

September 23, 2009

Growing Garlic (Recipe: Garlic Soup)

Every spring when I see garlic scapes at the Farmers’ Market, I slap my forehead wondering how I could forget again to plant garlic. Garlic, like Brussels sprouts, has a 6-month growing season. But unlike Brussels sprouts, which I see at the market when I’m gathering my other spring and summer crops, the garlic goes in when I’m cleaning up the gardening in preparation for the winter. Specifically, it’s planted four weeks before the ground freezes.

This year, I put the date on my calendar. September 24th: Plant Garlic. Thankfully, I received an email reminder from Seeds of Change to order my garlic seeds.

Garlic bulbs grow from the previous season’s cloves. But, you can’t just pick up a bulb from the local market. Not all garlic will sprout. Nowadays, much of the supermarket garlic is bred to not sprout. And most likely it is not organic. So, I accept that I will order garlic “seed” on-line. That was an easy decision.

Hard Neck vs. Soft Neck
The hard neck garlic produces the scape – the garlic flavored green shoot that sprouts up before the bulb is mature. The bulbs, once harvested, can be stored up to six months.

The soft neck garlic doesn’t produce the scape, but they have a longer storage life – up to one year.

Beyond that, there are about a dozen varieties of each. Purple skin, white skin, large bulb, small bulb. Spicy, mild. Suitable for warm climates, cold climates. And it’s unclear if I’ll actually get what I order… Seeds of Change does not guarantee quantities of any variety, so I threw a dart to the wall to decide.

I ordered one “unit” of soft neck and one “unit” of hardneck. Each unit has 3 bulbs, totally approximately 20-30 seeds. I'll be safe of vampires next summer. Stay tuned…

For more tips on growing garlic, go here.

And to get in the mood for garlic, here’s a variation on the classic Spanish Garlic Soup.

Garlic Soup with Romesco

12 + garlic cloves
8 slices bread
1/4 cup olive oil
8 cups chicken stock
3 tbs. sherry fino
3 eggs
2 tbs. cream
salt and pepper to taste

1. Heat oil in a large pan. Add garlic and cook until it begins to brown. Remove.
2. Fry bread in oil. Set aside.
3. Return garlic to pan, add chicken stock and sherry. Simmer for 20 minutes.
4. Puree.
5. Beat eggs with cream. Slowly pour a ladel of soup into egg mix. Whisk into remaining soup. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Heat to just below simmer. Garnish with Romesco and Parsley

Romesco
1 red peppers
1 hot pepper
1 shallot, diced
1 garlic clove,
1/4 cup olive oil
2 tomato
1/4 cup almonds
balsamic or red wine vinegar
salt and pepper to taste

1. Seed peppers and cut into quarters. Cut tomato into quarters.
2. Put all ingredients, except vinegar, in a pot. Roast until peppers begin to brown.
3. Drain oil and reserve. Puree remaining ingredients. Drizzle in oil. Adjust seasoning with vinegar, salt and pepper.

That extra loving touch: In a skillet, add 1/4 cup olive oil. Fry almond slices, garlic slices and parsley leaves. When garlic begins to brown, drain on a paper towel and season to taste with salt and pepper. Garnish crouton with crispies.

June 1, 2009

Garden Surprises

As I pulled out my tape measure the other morning to thin some plants to
precisely 5 inches apart, an onlooker might think I’m quite anal about tending
to my vegetable garden. Perhaps.

But in some ways I am also quite lazy. One
thing I don’t do is label the plantings. I figure the vegetables will present
themselves when they’re ready.

While the initial sprouts of cucumber and
zucchini look similar, the flowers and vegetables dispel any similarities. And
since I have not reached the level of sophistication of watering or fertilizing
plants on different schedules to suit the individual needs, I really see no
point in taking the extra step to label the garden.

This year, I planted several
new crops, including what I thought was going to be radishes. As the shoulders
of the root began to push out above the surface of the dirt, I thought,
“Perfect, ready to harvest.” So I began pulling up the first few, only to
discover I had in fact planted turnips. Whoops! And being turnips, they still
needed to grow a bit larger.

The turnip greens, however, can be cooked now. A
search of the web yields recipes mostly for a southern style preparation with
some form of pork product. As much as I love pork, I’m realizing that many of my
favorite people don’t eat it, so I’m making a concerted effort to post more
recipes without it. Jody
Adams suggests a simple preparation: sautéing the greens in extra virgin
olive oil with lots of garlic and chili flakes.

For a more substantial meal, I
offer this recipe:

White Bean and Turnip Green
Soup with Chicken Sausage (a variation of Tuscan Kale Soup)

2 tbs. olive oil

1 onion, peeled and coarsely chopped

4 garlic cloves, peeled
and coarsely chopped

½ celery stalk, coarsely chopped

1 carrot, peeled and
coarsely chopped

2 cups cooked white beans

5 cups chicken broth, water or
combination of the two

1 piece of parmigiano reggiano rind

1 sprig fresh thyme,
chopped

½ tsp. Black pepper

1/2 pound smoked chicken sausage, sliced

1 carrot

1
pound turnip greens (or kale), coarsely chopped

2 tsp. salt

1. Heat oil in a large pot
over medium heat. Add onions, garlic, celery and carrots, and cook until soft,
about 4 or 5 minutes. Add beans, liquid, cheese rind, and thyme. Season to taste
with salt and pepper. Bring to a boil and reduce to a simmer. Cook uncovered for
about 20 minutes.

2. Meanwhile, brown sausage in batches over medium heat.

3.
Stir in turnip greens and sausage. Cook for 10 minutes or until greens are
wilted and tender.

4. Add water, if necessary to thin soup. Adjust seasoning
with salt and pepper to taste.

May 29, 2009

Asparagus Vichyssoise with Saut éed Morels

I never know how much fiddleheads and morels I’ll be able to get each year, so I always make sure to cook them at least once each Spring. But with the temperamental prices and my cooking schedule, I never know if the second opportunity will arise.

The first cooking, I keep simple. I want to savor the flavors and textures, uncluttered. The second cooking, I tend to be more “creative.” An elegant way to serve the morels is atop an asparagus vichyssoise.

Asparagus Vichyssoise with Sautéed Morels

1 qt. chicken or vegetable broth
1 tbs. olive oil
2 small leeks, chopped
1/4 cup potatoes, diced
24 asparagus spears, trimmed, tips reserved
2 sprigs parsley
1 cup spinach
salt and pepper to taste

Morels
1/2 pound morels, wiped clean
1 large shallot, peeled and diced
2 cloves garlic, peeled and thinly sliced
1 teaspoon fresh thyme, chopped
1/4 cup dry sherry

For the Soup:
1. Heat olive oil in large pot. Sweat leeks and potatoes. Add asparagus, parsley and chicken broth. Simmer for 15 minutes or until asparagus and potatoes are tender.

2. Put 1/4 cup spinach in the bottom of a blender. Ladle soup into blender and puree. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Repeat process until all the soup is pureed.

3. Bring a small pot of salted water to a boil. Blanch the asparagus tips for 1 minute. Drain and run under cold water to lock in the color.

4. Garnish soup with asparagus tips and morels.

For the Morels:
1. Melt butter in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the morels. Sprinkle shallots, garlic and thyme on top. Season with salt and pepper. Let cook for 3 minutes without stirring or shaking. Stir a little and cook for another minute.

2. Deglaze the pan with sherry. Cook for another two minutes until the sherry is absorbed. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

If I have a third chance, I will serve sautéed morels with seared foie gras. I still have a small piece left over in the freezer.

April 10, 2009

Floaters or Sinkers?

My friend Amy and I were both hosting our families for Passover this year and decided to collaborate on some of our holiday cooking. As we pulled together our menus and recipes, the inevitable question had to be asked, “Do you like floaters or sinkers?” Of course, we were referring the matzo balls in the soup that precedes every Passover meal around the globe.

Lead bombs may be a more accurate description of the matzo balls I’ve made in the past. As Amy astutely noted, they all really float. Nonetheless, every year I strive for feather light floaters. Every bubbe has her secret, but sadly, I was never taught. My mother, bless her heart, swore upon whipping up the eggs until they tripled in volume. Others advise using seltzer water. And every year, I follow exacting instructions… some years I’ve achieved success, but mostly lead bombs.

Both the seltzer and whipped eggs strive for the same effect – creating air pockets within the batter that expand when cooked. The expanded air pockets get trapped within the dough as it cooks. More air pockets beget lighter balls. The inherent problem with these recommendations is that after you’ve incorporated all these little air pockets, the recipe tells you to let the batter sit for 30 minutes before forming and cooking the matzo balls. During those 30 minutes all the air bubbles deflate and escape. No air-pockets in the matzo balls = lead bombs.

Finally, finally this year, I synthesized all my mistakes and wisdom to create feather light matzo balls. The secret is to make the batter as wet as possible and still hold together when cooked. The water in the batter turns into steam when cooked, pushing against the dough, expanding it to create air pockets. When the matzo balls “set” (i.e. the proteins coagulate and the starches gel), the air bubbles are trapped inside.

And just to be extra safe, I also whipped my eggs until they tripled in volume.

I combined two recipes from Joan Nathan’s “Jewish Cooking in America” If you don’t have this book, and enjoy Jewish cooking, I highly recommend you purchase it. I’ve made the gefilte fish, kugel and many others to rave reviews.

Stuffed Matzo Balls
4 eggs
2 tablespoons chicken fat, melted
½ cup water or seltzer
1 cup matzo meal
Salt and pepper to taste

Stuffing
1 onion, finely chopped
2 tablespoons chicken fat
1 egg
2 tablespoons matzo meal
½ teaspoon cinnamon

1. Whip eggs with an electric mixture at high speed until tripled in volume.
2. To the eggs, add the chicken fat, water and matzo meal. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Let stand for 30 minutes.
3. Meanwhile, make the stuffing: cook the onions with the chicken fat over medium heat, stirring frequently, until the onions are dark brown. Remove from heat and mix in the matzo meal, egg and cinnamon.
4. Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Season generously with salt.
5. Form the matzo balls: with wet hands scoop out about 2 tablespoons of matzo ball mix. Flatten into a round disc around 2 inches around. Put a teaspoon of stuffing in the middle and form the matzo ball around it. Gently place into the boiling water. Repeat this process until all the matzo balls are made – should yield about 12.
6. Cook matzo balls for 30 minutes. Serve with chicken soup.

This recipe doubles and triples well.

Lori Lynn from TaSte WiTh ThE EyEs is hosting a passover round-up, to which I am submitting this recipe. She's posting the round-up on April 15th, but you should go to her blog sooner and often for great recipes and stories.

November 20, 2008

Sweet Potato Vichyssoise

While we think of sweet potatoes as a winter vegetable, they are actually grown in the summer. Shooting up green vines from the earth, each plant will yield up to 5 pounds of this sweet tuber. They last for months if stored properly in a root cellar. Two months after harvest, I'm still enjoying my stash that I brought back with me to Cambridge.

An interesting factoid about sweet potatoes: they actually get sweeter after they've been harvested. Once the plant is cut away, a chemical reaction occurs turning the starches into sugars. As such,the sweet potatoes need to cure for at least one week after harvesting before eating or cooking.

There are dozens of varieties of sweet potatoes — both white and orange. Typically, in New England, you'll find jewel. To hear Brett describe them, they are pure sugar. His favorite varieties are white hamon and beauregard. These offer sweet, nuanced and balanced flavor.

Here are some more thoughts from Brett about sweet potatoes:

Very large sweet potatoes are unjustly scorned by novices, but old-time Southern cooks treasure the mammoths for ease of use. They also know that a slowly grown but big sweet potato is more flavorful than a typical conventionally grown, smaller sweet potato whose growth was rushed and babied with agricultural chemicals.

Different sweet potato cultivars have markedly different flesh colors and flavors. The white types (actually beige, to my eye) usually have a nuttier, nuanced suite of flavors, and often a less creamy and more stringy texture, than the orange types. White Hamon is an exception, being both very sweet and creamy and with a unique beige-pale green flesh when cooked in certain ways. We will let you know the names of the types you are receiving. I personally prefer the white kinds for savory roasted uses and the orange types for pies, but there is naught more subjective than palate opinions.

Sweet Potato Vichyssoise is a fantastic summer-time chilled soup, but can also be served hot on a cold winter evening.

3 tablespoons butter
1 small onion, peeled and chopped
1 celery stalk
4 garlic clove
1/4 cup white wine
2 medium large sweet potatoes
4 cups water
2 leek — washed
1/4 cup cream

1. Heat pot over medium heat. Add 2 tbs. butter. Add onions, garlic, leeks and celery. Sweat for about 5 minutes. Deglaze with white wine

2. Add potatoes and water. Simmer for about 30 minutes, or until potatoes are tender.

3. Puree soup. Add cream. Season to taste with salt, pepper and lemon juice

4. Chill soup.

5. While soup is chillin', heat a large sauté pan over high heat. Add remaining butter, corn, shallots and garlic. Sauté without shaking the pan, for 3 minutes, or until the corn becomes sweetly aromatic. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

6. Puree chipotle peppers with 1/4 cup water and 1 tbs. red wine vinegar

7. When soup is chilled, garnish with
a- corn and a drizzle of the chipotle puree, or
b- spicy sausage and scallions