pumpkin and white bean soup
from the Greens cookbook (1987) written by the chefs of the same-named restaurant in California to which I have never been. So sad.
found the most beautiful Cinderella pumpkin at the Cortelyou Farmer’s market. It would have made a wonderful carriage, green like patina on copper, frosty white in patches. Not being a fairy godmother, I made a soup instead. It was a hefty pumpkin, and I used half, approximately ¾ pound or 4-5 cups when cut in chunks.
halving a pumpkin and skinning it is not for the faint of heart—a serious knife should be employed for the purpose. If you don’t yet have a beloved blade then ask a friend with kitchen wits and witchery (and a bit of cash flow) to get you a good Chef’s knife for your birthday. A fine knife will make you more eager to cut up veggies and entices your foodie friends to cook in your kitchen. Back to the pumpkin: plunge your knife tip into the skin near the stem, the bottom is usually the flattest part of the thing and should sit steadily on your cutting board but having a friend help you steady it is not a bad idea, and carefully bear down along the whole blade, towards the bottom of the pumpkin. Pull out the blade and start again as often as you need. Bit by bit is better than a dramatic cleaving and trip to the emergency room. Repeat on the other side.
scoop the seeds and goop from the pumpkin halves. if you want, reserve some of the seeds for toasted pumpkin seeds, and pile up at least some of the seeds and all of the pulp to use for the stock. slice of the pumpkin skins and set aside for stock as well. cut the pumpkin into slices about an inch wide then across to make large chunks.
wash one medium or two small leeks. Slice off the greens and set aside. Slice down the center of the leeks and across into thin half moon strips. Smash and peel two or three cloves of garlic. Scrub and chop a few carrots or parsnips (parsnips are really nice) and several ribs of celery.
in a large pot, heat a tablespoon of olive oil. add the garlic and leek greens and stir to coat and cook a few moments. stir in the celery. add in the pumpkin pulp and seeds and a few stalks of parsley. Salt and pepper the whole lot. Pour in about six cups of water. Bring to a simmer and cook for about 20 minutes. Turn off the heat and let cool a bit before draining, squeezing the rich broth from the veggies by pressing them in a colander over a bowl or pot.
in a soup pot, heat a few slugs of olive oil. add the leeks and stir, cooking over a medium flame until they begin to soften. toss in the pumpkin and carrots, stirring to coat. Cook for about 9 minutes, stirring occasionally or often depending on how wide or narrow your pot is. salt and pepper (white pepper if you have it) and stir in a handful of sage and/or thyme. Pour in the stock and bring to a simmer. Cook for about half an hour (sometimes longer) until the pumpkin begins to fall apart. Stir it every once and awhile.
add a few cups of cooked white beans* and a cup or two of the bean cooking liquid and stir. Cook for another 15 minutes or so, until the pumpkin is an orange velvet background to the beans.
top with a drizzle of olive oil, chopped parsley and a squeeze of lemon or swirl in a spoonful of plain yoghurt, crème fraiche or sour cream. Serve with piles of warm, excellent bread.
* to make the beans: pick through two cups of dried small white beans, like navy beans, and remove any bad beans or junk. bring a pot of water to a boil, about three time the amount of beans. turn off the heat and add the beans and let sit for an hour. rinse the soaked beans in cold water, combine with fresh water in the pot, add in stalks of fresh or dried sage and thyme and bring to a boil. cook for about an hour or al dente. drain, saving some of the cooking liquid.
lentils for anemic royalty
my flatmate who is leaving for India is also anemic, and the Radical Muffin kitchen has been making iron rich concoctions to help! Cook these yummy lentils in a cast iron skillet and serve with steamed greens and a big glass of OJ for maximum metal absorption.
mince one red onion, two cloves of garlic, and 1 inch of peeled fresh ginger, combine in a pile or bowl. Dice 2 medium carrots. Chop 4-5 fresh tomatoes if it’s the season; otherwise, open up a big can, about a cup and a half, of diced tomatoes.
in a hot skillet, for just a moment or two, toast 1 1/2 teaspoons each of sweet and hot paprika, 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon (unless you are cooking for the kitchen witch who is allergic), and 6-10 cardamom pods, lightly crushed in a mortar or pestle or some improvisation of that tool. Add one teaspoon each of red pepper flakes, coriander, mustard seeds, garam masala, and tumeric.
stir in 2 tablespoons of sunflower or veggie oil. Let the oil get hot then stir in the garlic pile. Cook for 5 minutes or until the onions have softened, stirring occasionally.
add one cup of red lentils. Stir. Pour in 1 2/3 cup of coconut milk and one cup of water. Bring to a boil and stir in the tomatoes. Bring back to a boil and stir, then reduce the heat and simmer for half an hour to 45 minutes. Resist the temptation to stir too often—lentils are delicate, breaking down to mush quickly. Gently swirl and cover and cook over low heat.
slice and 3 scallions. Chop a few fistfuls of fresh cilantro and/or parsley if you have it and set aside.
ladle into bowls over brown rice or jasmine rice. Sprinkle with cilantro and scallions; serve with wedges of lime. Excellent with a drizzle of Greek yoghurt or raita.
And later, much later, the green fairy.
a morning
The truck out the window reads “good for the earth” in white on blue. It’s small flashing yellow sidelights beaconing in the grey- it’s early morning, the time of school kids starting out on their long walk, the people who open offices, those who open coffee joints, and dawn-lovers like me.
In Manhattan, the bagel cart guys are all ready with huge chargers of coffee and pre-cream-cheesed bagels all in a row. I worry about the Polish guy who supplies my workaday bagel; he has no heater in his 9 foot by 4 foot metal trailer. He takes up most of it, standing close to the steaming coffee, parked outside the moviestar Penelope Cruz’s new clothing line, the flagship store. When I rummage around in my bag for change longer than usual, he tells me to pay him tomorrow or next week. In Brooklyn, the bagel guy hasn’t delivered to this cafe yet.
Someone’s smoking outside, leaning on the bench and the big window under the awning. I’ve quit. It’s freezing from the thin sheets of black ice water on all the concrete. It’s sort of raining; the Hasidic women carry black umbrellas. The January weather comes in through the open door into the golden inside. The tabletops are sunflower colored vinyl, two with green block prints of garlic bulbs tumbling in and out of wavering brown grasses. The coffee is organically grown, fair trade, bottomless cup. The woman’s voice through the speakers sings in Hindi then there’s soft chanting over lingering cords on mystical instruments.
The smoker is a woman, red-haired long-haired woman who strides past the door in a scarlet velvet coat wrapping her waist and swirling around her boot tops.
Lemony Gingery Veggie Stock
Fill your big and heavy pot with clean water and put it on the stovetop to boil. Scrub two fist-sized turnips, a potato, and two carrots (the ones so big you cannot imagine using them for anything in the kitchen). Trim any stems or roots. Trim four stalks of celery too; rinse them if they are dirty. Toss all these veggies in the pot.
Press three cloves of garlic under the flat side of a knife and peel. Break three inches of ginger into pieces. Cut a lemon into quarters. Toss all of this into the pot.
Bring the water to a rolling boil then let it fall back to a simmer for half an hour.
Stem any mushrooms you have about for this recipe or any others. Wipe them clean and add to the stock. Pour in a few cups of water. Cover and bring back to boil then simmer half-covered for another hour or so. Stir occasionally, and use the back of the spoon to squish the ingredients gently, especially the lemons.
In your sink, set a colander in a bowl or pot large enough to hold all that hot stock. Pour the stock through and using cheesecloth or the back of a wooden spoon, mush the veggies to squeeze their best stuff into the broth.
Let the broth cool and store in jars in the frigidaire. Or you can use it right away to back soup. Viola:
Miso Awesome Soup
The amounts here are for a generous bowl for one voracious feminista yogi. This soup is quite adaptable by size – feed your feminista yogi flock!
Bring a pot of water to boil and cook a handful of udon noodles. The corner health mart carries an organic brand that comes in 8 oz packets with three bundles of noodles, and one bundle is just right amount for a big bowl. (One big bowl eating is typically friendly cooking for one eater, one broke but taste-conscious eater. Those inspired, sexy soups, pastas, and salads you whip up for dates with your one true one want a roomy, gorgeous bowl. Right now my favorite is a ceramic piece that heats up comfortingly in my lap when I sit cross legged on the couch. This bowl, runny with glaze in cinnamon, oatmeal and cream, is my flat mate’s handmade treasure. I gotta find my own perfect piece; I will let you know how the quest goes.)
Slice two or three scallions (green onions). Peel and mince an inch of ginger and two cloves of garlic. Slice three or four thin slices of chili. Chili is highly subjective; know thyself.
In a medium sized sauce pan, heat a few teaspoons of vegetable oil and sesame oil. When a flick of water sizzles in the oil, lower the heat and add the chili, garlic, ginger, and scallions along with some sea salt and black pepper. Add two to four tablespoons of tamari.
Clean off your mushrooms—any kind you like, of course. I used the smallest possible shitakes and creminis, carefully de-stemmed and cleaned with a paper towel. Sauté the mushrooms briefly in the fiery oil, about five minutes, until their heads are glistening and glossy brown.
Pour broth over the frying mushrooms, about 3 cups. Bring broth to a boil.
Halve a lemon. Snip a cup or so of watercress and add it to your bowl.
Lower heat and with the soup at a low simmer, squeeze in the lemon juice from both halves and stir in two tablespoons of miso. Bring back to a fine simmer and pour over the delicate greens.
I eat this with two tools: chopsticks and a big, shallow spoon.
doctored-up tomato soup (for jay)
ingredients
tomato soup – either one box (typically 32 fluid ounces or 1 quart), which does not need water added, or one can of condensed soup (15 fluid ounces), which will need a can of water stirred into it
½ an onion – red or yellow; save the other half for something else
2 cloves of garlic – a bulb is the whole little head you buy; the cloves are the fingers of the garlic fist
paprika – spice
olive oil
Peel and chop the onion. To do this, slice off the scraggly top and the bottom. Sit your onion on one of these flat ends on the cutting board and slice it down the center so you have two halves. Peel off the papery outer layer. Lay each half flat on the cutting board and slice the onion into ribbons then turn the onion half and cut across your slices to make cubes. If you cut the slices very thin, you can just use those and not cut again. That makes for a pretty soup.
Peel and mince the garlic. To do this, rub the outermost papery layer off your garlic bulb. Pull off two cloves (more if you want it really garlicky). Smash the garlic still in its skin under the flat side of your knife. The skin will rumple and be easy to peel right off. Cut off the dry stem end and then chop the garlic finely.
On the stove top, heat a little olive oil (about 2 teaspoons) in a pot over a medium flame. Add about 2 teaspoons of paprika, the garlic and the onion. Stirring every few minutes, cook until the onions are translucent about 10 minutes. Careful about how high the heat is – you don’t want the garlic to brown.
Add the soup, the box or the can & water. Stir, heat and eat!
Of course, this recipe is just an idea. You don’t have to have paprika, right? Leave it out or try other spices or herbs like dried oregano. There are lots of good ways to make simple soup more exciting and use it as a vehicle for more veggies! Try adding spinach, a can of chick peas, or left over broccoli from another dinner.
cannellini bean & roasted garlic soup
- cannellini beans
- dried rosemary
- dried oregano
- 2 bulbs of garlic
- water
- veggie stock
- white wine
- sage
- rosemary
to cook the beans
Pick over the dried cannellini beans: run your fingers over and through them in a colander, bowl or on a cookie sheet, looking for & tossing beans that are shriveled or darkened. You can be more or less meticulous about this based on time & personality. At minimum, make sure there are no pebbles or grit.
Rinse the beans in cold water a few times then soak them, covered generously with cold water, overnight. The following day, dump the beans into a colander and rinse them a few times.
Transfer to a large, sturdy pot and add water. Cannellinis, like most beans, take 3 cups of water per cup of dried beans. Bring to a low boil, angle the lid to only partially cover the pot, and let simmer away. Toss in a small handful of dried rosemary and oregano. Cook the cannellinis for about 45 minutes. The beans should be just about tender but not quite as done as you’d like them if you were going to eat them right away.
Reserve 2 cups or so of the broth; pour it into a measuring cup or other container. Drain the beans. Let cool and toss with olive oil. Stash any beans you aren’t using immediately in the fridge until you are ready to use them.
to make the soup
Roast one bulb of garlic. Rub off the top layers of papery skin, slice the top and bottom flat, set it in a square of foil, drizzle with your best olive oil. Seal the foil and roast in a 375 degree oven for about an hour, until it is soft and carmelly.
If you are cooking beans and making soup all in one go then start the garlic before you start the beans. This creates time for it to cool for handling.
Peel and mince 4 cloves of garlic. Mince about 2 tablespoons worth of rosemary and sage.
Now it gets tricky – put everything in the pot and simmer for hours.
In a big, heavy pot, combine about 4 cups of the beans with 2 cups of veg broth, 2 cups of wine and 2 cups of water. Add the minced garlic. Over medium-high heat and covered, bring the soup to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer.
Reserve some of the oil from the roasted garlic to drizzle over the soup later then squeeze the roasted garlic cloves into the pot. Cook for at least an hour; you want the level of the soup to drop a few inches. Add more liquid if you like. Stir lazily but frequently with a wooden spoon, squishing some of the beans against the side of the pot to mush them. Mashing the beans thickens your soup, so mush more or less depending on your personal tastes. If it is a fancy sort of occasion and you have the equipment – you could run the whole lot through a blender for a beautiful, velvety white soup. You might want to keep out the fresh herbs and stir them in after you’ve reheated the puree.
To serve as they would in Tuscany, ladle over a slab of toasted Italian bread and drizzle with the garlic oil. I humbly recommend a rosemary loaf or sourdough.
