Wednesday, January 1, 2014

Kitchen Chemist - Pea Soup

I will begin posting about some of my adventures as a Kitchen Chemist, aka a young pseudo-chef who marries her own family knowledge & skill with Googled recipes and a flair of creativity.

Today's post: Pea Soup!

I used this "Easy Peasy Pea Soup" recipe from Food Network as a basis for my soup, though I was missing a decent amount of ingredients. Here is what I actually used:


  • 2 cans of sweet peas
  • 2 medium onions, halved and diced (I diced chunkier for a more textured soup, up to you)
  • 3 celery stalks, halved lengthwise and diced (I diced chunkier for a more textured soup, up to you)
  • My own vegetable broth from the spices I had based off Vegetable Broth #1 from FitDay
  • 1 1/2 cups of store-bought bacon bits
  • 1/3 cup corn starch
  • 2 cloves garlic, pressed
  • Vegetable oil as needed when sautéing
  • Assorted spices according to my taste & what I had on-hand: cumin, celery seed, garlic salt, salt, pepper, savory, marjoram, thyme, sage, chili powder
  • A few tablespoons of corn starch to thicken soup to my desired consistency

Before starting, I used my Magic Bullet blender to puree 1 1/ of the 2 cans of sweet peas and the can juices. I put the puree in a metal mixing bowl and mixed in the leftover whole peas, and set that aside. I started by sautéing the onion and celery in vegetable oil, and simultaneously brought water with the broth ingredients (cumin, celery seed, garlic salt, savory, marjoram, thyme, sage) to a boil in a small pot, probably 3-4 cups of liquid total. When the onion & celery were cooked & starting to brown a little, around 8 minutes or so on med-hi, I pressed the fresh garlic into the pot and added the cumin (my husband loves cumin so I put in a little extra). I added the bacon and let that cook with the onions, celery and cooked that another couple minutes, then added the broth I had made and the pea mixture. I stirred everything and kept it over medium heat to intertwine the flavors and heat the soup through. The soup was a little thinner than I wanted, so I added some cornstarch a tablespoons at a time and whisked the soup. Once I had removed the pot from heat and let it sit a few minutes, the consistency was perfect. We like a little tiny kick to our food, so I added a few sprinkles of chili powder for fun. The soup turned out great! It's going to be a comforting dinner on this snowy New Year's Day. 


Pea soup doesn't look chunky just sitting there...


...but one bite and you get all the veggies and bacon chunks you could want!

Snowy porch on NYD


Patio table covered in glittery snow
Hope you enjoyed this post - try out this soup, it was quick, easy, and very tasty! Happy cooking, & Happy New Year!

Emily

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