Root Soup with Kale Chips

I spent the morning detailing my refrigerator. Seriously. I gathered my husband’s collection of brushes and probes for the non-greasy parts of the car and small equipment, and went to town. Actually, I wish I’d gone to town. Instead, I stayed home in the falling snow and emptied and cleaned my fussy fridge. I had two goals. One was to stop the flooding. My refrigerator floods itself every so often. I know that sounds silly. What gal in her right mind would buy a (costly German) refrigerator that floods? (I loved its hardware, dimensions and materials. Designers are not always the most rational people on the planet.) It floods when stuff gets crammed against the back wall, which acts like a vertical plane for condensation flowing to a tiny hole at the bottom of an inclined trough. It also floods when the tiny hole gets some little bit stuck in it. How inconvenient.

The other goal in cleaning house was to inventory the storage vegetables remaining after a long winter. It’s always my goal to be ready to start over by Easter, even though there will be a gap in substantial local produce until May. 

The fridge coughed up several varieties of turnips and beets, violet and green kohlrabi, a couple of parsnips, and celeriac bulbs. Not to mention cabbage, leeks, and carrots, some of which arrived more recently than the first list. I sorted them into soup groups: the first up would be a root vegetable soup of leeks and onions combined with celeriac, two varieties of turnips, and parsnips. This turned out to be a delicious combination, naturally sweet and creamy. To finish off the soup, I added a touch of half-and-half (cream and milk) and garnished it with spunky, crispy kale chips made from the lone stalk discovered during the clean-out.

Kale chips are terrific snacks and are simple and quick to make. Just be sure to rub the olive oil into the leaves thoroughly (like I did with my kale salad this winter) before salting and slipping them into the oven until dried and crisp. They offered my creamy soup a welcome salty crunch, a change from the typical garnish of snipped fresh herbs.

Root Soup

2 medium-large parsnips, peeled and cut into chunks

1 medium celeriac bulb, peeled and cut into chunks

3-4 turnips, peeled and cut into chunks (I used 1 large gold ball turnip and 5 very small white turnips)

1 large leek, white and pale green portions, cleaned and sliced

1 small onion, peeled and chopped

4 c homemade chicken stock

Salt

¼ c cream or half-and-half

Garnish: kale chips or fresh parsley, chopped

Place the vegetables in a large pot with the chicken stock, adding water if necessary to cover the vegetables. Bring to a boil, lower the heat, and simmer until the vegetables are tender. Puree the soup using an immersion blender or food processor and return to the pot. Add salt if necessary.

When ready to serve, add the cream or half-and-half and bring to a simmer. Serve hot, garnished with herbs or kale chips.

Serves 6-8.

Kale Chips

Curly kale, leaves stripped from the stems, washed and thoroughly dried

Olive oil

Coarse salt (Kosher or sea salt)

Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Tear the kale leaves into small pieces. Place them on a baking sheet and sprinkle them with a little olive oil. Rub the leaves to absorb the oil. Sprinkle with salt. Place the pan in the oven and cook the kale for 10 minutes or a little longer, until the edges start to dry but not brown. Remove from the baking pan to cool.

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Waste Not Want Not: Cheese Rinds and a Celery Soup

The garden’s getting drenched with rain today, thankfully, so I stayed inside and made soup. Lovely celery and leek soup feels spring-like, light and nourishing just like the rain. Local leeks were back in this morning’s farmers’ market so I wanted to build a soup around them. I also had an abundance of organic celery with lots of leaves, a perfect pairing with the leeks, united by homemade chicken stock from last weekend’s roast. And then there was the secret ingredient: a hunk of rind from Parmesan cheese. When the cheese is mostly grated off and the rinds start to harden, I just tuck them away in a plastic bag in the refrigerator and add them to soup. They impart a rich flavor to the soup base and I know I’ve wrung the most flavor from a fairly expensive ingredient.

Celery Rice Soup

6-7 stalks of celery, preferably inner stalks, diced (about 3 cups), leaves reserved

1 leek, white and light green parts, cleaned, halves lengthwise and sliced

2 tsp butter

4 c homemade chicken stock

1 piece (1×2 inches or so) Parmesan cheese rind

1/3 c raw rice (or 1 c cooked)

Salt

Optional: grated Parmesan cheese

Optional: Parmesan cheese croutons

Slowly saute the celery and leek in butter until the leek start to soften. Add the chicken stock and cheese rind and bring to a boil. Lower the heat and simmer for about 10 minutes. Add the raw rice and cook for another 15-20 minutes until the rice is tender, adding additional liquid (water or stock) if the soup gets too thick. Adjust for salt and add chopped celery leaves, reserving a few for the final garnish. Serve hot, sprinkled with Parmesan cheese and additional chopped celery leaves. Parmesan cheese toasts are a nice accompaniment.

Serves 4.

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Orange-braised Celery

Even before I challenged myself to eat as locally as possible during the winter months, I favored the fruits and vegetables of cold months, eschewing zucchini and eggplant and tomatoes as summer fare. Citrus and celery fall into the chosen group. Citrus is obvious since it is abundant in the south. Celery maybe is less obvious, but on my list because of its association with carrots and onions (good keepers), as the aromatic base for European dishes. Celery, however, is one of the “dirty dozen,” foods most likely to retain – and therefore transmit to us – pesticides that treat them. As a result, I buy only organic celery, choosing mostly to rely on the Asian celery perennial in my garden for broths and on the (way too tough) stalks that are harvested (sometimes) from our CSA.

 All that said, I can’t resist a winter braise of Pascal celery, since cooked celery is a family favorite. While I normally braise celery on top of the stove, I chose the oven because the celery takes some time (over an hour) and I didn’t have the patience to babysit it. After washing the celery (it harbors dirt) and cutting the stalks to fit a buttered roasting pan, I chopped the tender tops and leaves along with some onion and sautéed them lightly in butter. I added the juice of an orange and a teaspoon of orange zest and let the liquid reduce. In went chicken broth, halfway up the volume of the celery stalks. Covered with foil, it baked in a slow oven until tender, over an hour! I cranked up the heat and topped the celery with coarse breadcrumbs tossed in orange zest, celery leaves, thyme and butter, to form a crispy crust. This had great textural and flavor contrasts. The silky and almost unctuous celery was sparked by the addition of the orange, an antidote to what promises to be a damp and chilly evening.

You might notice that I added no salt. Celery is naturally high in sodium so I didn’t feel the need. The next time I make this, I might add chopped black olives cured in oil to the topping. 

Orange-braised Celery

About 6 inner stalks of celery

Butter

1 small or half a medium onion, chopped

Zest and juice of 1 orange

About 1/3 c chicken broth

¼ tsp dried thyme

½ c coarse fresh breadcrumbs

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Butter a small casserole dish such as an oval Le Creuset enameled cast iron pan. Wash the celery well and remove any tough strings. Cut the base of the stalks in lengths to fit the pan. Chop the tender tops, including the leaves. Set about a tablespoonful of leaves aside.

Saute the onion and chopped celery in butter until translucent. Add the orange juice and half of the orange zest, adding the other half to the reserved celery leaves. Let the orange juice reduce in the pan, and add 1/3 cup of chicken broth to warm it. Pour the liquid and vegetable mixture over the celery stalks, adjusting the liquid so that it comes about halfway up the sides of the stalks. Cover the pan with foil and bake in the oven for about an hour. Check the tenderness and continue to cook until the stalks are tender but not falling apart.

Increase the oven heat to 425 degrees. Sauté the breadcrumbs in a little butter and toss them with the reserved celery leaves, orange zest and thyme. Spoon over the top of the celery and bake until the breadcrumbs are brown and crispy, about 7 minutes.

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Dark Days 13: Root Soup with Cheese Wafers and Slaw

A continuing series on weekly meals that use sustainable, organic, local and ethical food during the challenging winter months. For more information, go here to the DDC section of Not Dabbling in Normal’s website: Dark Days Challenge.

In which I make a garnished root soup that combines hominess with sophistication…

I need to clean out my refrigerator. I have been hoarding (well that’s a little harsh)… storing … lots of roots from our CSA and local farmers’ markets since late fall, and it’s time for them to go. Even though the Dark Days Challenge asks for local, sustainably produced and preferably organic meals once a week, I’m quite pleased that I cook that way all week, with the addition of a few non-local items here and there. Those are mostly grains that simply can’t survive our climate when grown here. And citrus fruit of course, though we’re still working our way through the crate that arrived from Florida as a gift at Christmas. I’ve barely touched the pantry, which remains voluminous. Next challenge. 

This meal is an amiable, kitchen-sink soup that can be made with various combinations of root vegetables and various combinations of liquid, including chicken stock, vegetable or bean broth, or simply water.  I used a little of each. I tend not to “junk up” the soup by including too many base ingredients. Here I used onion, rutabaga, parsnip, celeriac, and potato…

To pep things up, I made cheese “crackers” by baking grated cheese – a particularly dry and nutty type from Cherry Grove Farm called Havilah – on parchment paper in a hot oven until crisp. I made a slaw of carrots and parsnip combined with frizzled leeks and dressed with local white port from Hopewell Valley Vineyard and Stony Brook Finger Lakes Butternut Squash Seed Oil. The slaw garnished the soup and also floated on cheese crisps. This was lovely, sophisticated and homey all at once.

Root Soup

1 medium onion, coarsely chopped

1 tbsp ghee, butter or vegetable oil

1 3- or 4-inch rutabaga, peeled and cut into ½-inch cubes

2 small parsnips or 1 medium parsnip, peeled and sliced

1 2- or 3-inch celeriac root, peeled and cut into ½-inch cubes

1 large potato, peeled and cut into ½-inch cubes

A few cups of liquid: chicken stock, vegetable and/or bean broth, water

Salt and pepper

Place the onion and butter/ghee/oil in a medium saucepan and cook until the onion is translucent. Add the remaining vegetables and stir to coat. Add liquid (of choice) just to cover the vegetable. Bring to a simmer, cover the pan and cook until the vegetables are tender, adding more liquid if needed. Puree slightly and thin to desired consistency. Season to taste.

Cheese Wafers

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Finely grate 4 oz of a semi-hard and flavorful cheese. Place in ¼-cup mounds on a parchment lined baking sheet. Bake for 4-5 minutes until crisp and lightly browned. Remove from the oven. Let sit for a couple of minutes, and then remove to a plate to cool.

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Greatest Hits of 2011

So what clicked the most with my readers this year? A few conspicuous trends, heavy on the cannin’ and jammin’ as you would expect from a blog with the word “pantry” in the title. It was definitely a good year for the pantry, with over 250 jars added, not counting the ones I already gave away. Drum roll…here are this year’s winners:

How to Eat Your Lawn

This mini-series topped the charts, especially the violet jelly and dandelion jelly from flowers that grow in our so-called lawn (otherwise known as the prairie).  The violets went viral, with over 800 clicks in one day alone.  The jellies were delicious and went fast. Continuing the flower theme later in the season, I made Queen Anne’s Lace jelly, which was pretty special, and another jelly with electric blue borage blossoms.  Mint and rosemary jellies were right up there in the ranks, 5^th place this year. More herb jellies (like lemon basil and rose geranium) were part of my “Preserving Herbs” series.

Mo’ Marmalade Momma

Yup, once again on top of the charts are the three versions of Meyer lemon marmalade that I made for the inaugural month of the Tigress Can Jam of 2010. The lemons were a gift hand-carried from California and were made memorable by the addition of rosemary and ginger. This holds the all-time record as my most popular post.

Sweet ‘n’ Hot

Another all-time winner, again one of my entries in the 2010 Tigress Can Jam, is Sweet ‘n’ Hot Red Pepper Jam. I made a couple of cases of 4-ounce jars again this year to rave reviews. No one seems to have a favorite among the three versions: a plain one spiced with ginger, ditto but with a dab of adobo sauce (smokin’ good), and a third with star anise and cardamom (in the holiday spirit).  Tomato Salsa with Ancho Chili also made it onto a favorites list, probably since it’s been featured on other blogs like Punk Domestics.

Pickle Projects

A couple of pickle projects made the top ten, stealing votes from each other. One is a sweet ‘n’ hot bread and butter pickle and the other a group of three in one post: pickled garlic scapes, dill pickles, and more bread and butter pickles. Luckily I made a lot more of these this year than last so no one should complain.  A certain person I know eats them straight from the jar. For dinner.

Party Fare

Just when you thought that I cook only for the pantry, along comes a beautiful salmon terrine wrapped in leeks and stuffed with mushroom vodka cream, pretty enough for a party. This is the second most clicked-on post in the past two years and fourth this year. It was my entry in the monthly Paper Chef international challenge, which sadly has now folded. It had been the long running blog contest (over five years) before it faded away. I miss you guys.

Waste Not Want Not

Not a new concept for me, but called out explicitly in a series of posts about frugal cooking. On the theme of “use the whole plant,” I made a very popular Celeriac Soup in a post called “Roots, Stalks and Leaves” and a version in my new Waste Not Want Not series. While many people know this vegetable only by its knobby root, which is how it most often found in the supermarket, it actually has a useful stalk (substitute for Pascal celery if you want to eat locally) and leaves when you can get them from your CSA or the farmers’ market. As part of my Preserving Herbs series, I made celery salt from the leaves (for the pantry of course).

Auld Lang Syne

Much to my delight, Sour Cream Blueberry Bread made the cut. I used to be known for the volume and variety of quick breads that I made, a sucker volunteer for every bake sale and charity event involving food. I literally cooked my way through graduate school with recipes like this, producing wares sold at a weekly departmental lunch.

Happy New Year everyone!

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Waste Not Want Not: Carrot and Celeriac Roots and Greens as Puree and/or Soup

When the first fresh carrots and celeriac show up at our CSA or Farmers’ Market, the greens are young and tender and can be used as herbs or combined into purees and soups. The carrot greens can also be turned into pesto. Last year, I unwittingly created a family joke when I served carrot greens pesto with roasted baby carrots, declaring that I haven’t met a vegetable that I didn’t want to roast. Well, I don’t want to repeat my exaggeration by saying that I turn an amazing variety of green into pesto, but it’s true.

 Last year, I also made a delicious celeriac soup that used not only the bulb but also the stalks and leaves, and a carrot soup with its greens. This year, I made a carrot and celeriac soup base that was so thick that I first served it with roast chicken as a puree and then thinned it out into a soup, combined in both cases with pesto made from the leaves.  I had first thought to make this a creamed soup but chickened out. The thickness and creaminess were contributed by a couple of small potatoes. You could use water or chicken stock to make the puree or soup, but I used vegetable broth brewed from the trimmings of the ingredients and a few stray veggies.

Carrot and Celeriac Roots and Greens: Puree and/or Soup

3 medium carrots, with greens

1 small onion, diced (reserve the trimmings)

1 bulb of celeriac with greens

3 small yellow or red potatoes

Water and or vegetable broth (optional substitution: chicken stock)

Salt

Butter or olive oil

Make the vegetable broth. Trim and peel the carrot, reserving the peels. Trim and dice the onion, reserving the leftover pieces. Cut the greens from the celeriac and chop the stems and a few leaves. Peel the potatoes, reserving the peels, and place the peeled potatoes in cold water to keep them from discoloring. Place the trimmings in a saucepan and cover them with vegetable broth or water (add additional trimmings if using water or the broth will be weak). Salt it lightly Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes. You will need 3-5 cups of liquid depending on whether you are making a puree or soup.

Prepare and cook the vegetables for the puree or soup. Cut the peeled carrots and potatoes into small dice. Peel and cut the celeriac into small dice. Heat the butter or oil in a large saucepan and add the vegetables until they start to soften. Add the vegetable broth (or water or chicken stock) and simmer for 20 minutes or until the vegetables are very soft. Puree in a food processor or in the pan using an immersion blender.

Prepare the pesto. Place a handful of carrot greens and a few leaves (the most tender, please) of celeriac leaves in a food processor, mini chopper or blender. Add a drizzle of olive oil and a pinch of salt and puree into a pesto.

Assemble the dish. Add the pesto to the puree or soup, adjust the salt level and serve hot.

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Celery and Lovage Soup

Celery is at the top of the “dirty dozen” vegetables that harbor pesticides at the highest level. It basically has no “skin,” so whatever sprays, stays. Invisible, possibly toxic. It’s a vegetable that I happen to love raw and cooked, and is part of the triumvirate of vegetables known as “mirepoix,” which starts many a European dish, the other two being onions and carrots.  Our CSA grows celery so I do get to enjoy it, though they do not produce the thick, juicy stalks we are accustomed to from the supermarket. So why am I telling you this when I’m presenting a celery soup? Just to say, buy your celery from a reliable organic source. 

My refrigerator was harboring a large stalk of organic celery with plentiful leaves when I was about to leave on a business trip, so I decided it was a good candidate for soup to nourish the household left behind. I braised the celery and some local leeks in homemade chicken stock and then pureed half to make the liquid soup base, including raw leaves of both celery and the edgy celery-like herb lovage. (You can make this without the lovage, or substitute another green herb like parsley, or even a few spinach leaves.) The other half of the celery braise was added to make a chunky soup that I garnished with additional celery and lovage leaves. This simple soup has layers of flavor because of the combination of raw and cooked, smooth and chunky. It was better the next day, but perfectly fine hot off the stove. If you want a more full-bodied soup, add rice or wild rice and possibly some Parmesan cheese.

Celery and Lovage Soup

1 stalk organic celery

2 leeks

A few sprigs of lovage (or substitute other herbs like parsley, or more celery leaves)

2 tbsp butter or olive oil

1 qt (4 c) homemade or good quality chicken stock, or use vegetable broth

Salt and pepper to taste (needs little or none since celery is naturally salty)

Optional: ¼ c white rice or wild rice, grated Parmesan cheese

Separate the celery stalks and clean them. Pull the “strings” from the larger stalks, if necessary. Chop the entire stalk into ¼-inch or ½-inch pieces, leaves included, but cut off the root base. Reserve half of the leaves.

Melt the butter or warm the oil in a large pot. Add the celery, leeks, and few sprigs of lovage and cook slowly, with the pan covered, until the celery and leeks are softened, about 10 minutes.

Add chicken stock and bring to a boil. (Add the rice now if using.) Reduce the heat and simmer for about 15 minutes, or until the vegetables are very soft (and rice is cooked).

Puree half of the soup and mix with the remaining, chunkier half. Snip fresh herbs over the top to serve. .

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Dark Days Week 14: Celeriac and Potato Gratin

With daylight savings time upon us, the dark days don’t seem so dark anymore, except in the food department. We are still diligently working away at our plentiful roots and winter squash, among many other local provisions put away in the mad stash of late fall. This lovely, aromatic combination of thinly sliced celeriac and potato baked in milk and cream can be eaten as a meal or a side dish, and is adaptable to the addition of other ingredients such as sliced onions or bits of ham or bacon. There was a similar recipe published in the New York Times recently but this is my standard way of making this. I heat the potatoes and celeriac in warm milk and cream with a little salt and garlic, and then turn them into the baking dish.  This keeps them from discoloring and also makes them cook more evenly. I used waxy potatoes here and didn’t peel them because I thought their texture would be more compatible with the celeriac than floury potatoes.  Adjust the milk to the consistency of the potatoes.  I used a local cheese that reminds me of Gruyere.

Celeriac and Potato Gratin

2 large red or yellow potatoes

1 small or ½ large knob of celeriac

¾ c milk

¼ c heavy cream

1 clove garlic, thinly sliced

1 tsp salt

½ c grated cheese

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Butter or oil a baking dish. Bring the milk and cream to a simmer on the stove, add the garlic and salt, and turn off the heat. Prepare the potatoes and celeriac by peeling them (or leaving the skin on the potatoes if you want) and slicing them thin, dropping them in the liquid as you go to keep them from discoloring. Bring the liquid to nearly a boil, adding more milk if necessary. Pour the mixture into the prepared baking dish, neatly arranging the slices on top. Sprinkle with grated cheese and bake for about 40 minutes or until bubbly and brown.

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Black Lentils with Roasted Carrots and Celeriac

An improvised dish that evolved as I went along, this one’s a keeper. It may not look like much, but the combination of flavors was amazing. Typically, when I cook lentils as a main course or side dish, I add diced onions, carrots and sometimes turnip to the legumes while they’re cooking. Flavored with some herbs, salt and maybe pepper, it makes a nutritious dish. However, this combination is amped up by roasting diced carrots and celeriac, and adding a dressing of walnut oil and sherry wine vinegar and a sprinkling of cress-like chickweed (really).  I had lightly salted the vegetables when roasting them, but with the oil and vinegar, I bet you could leave out the salt and not notice. I served this lukewarm with salmon and a celeriac salad also dressed with walnut oil.

Black Lentils with Roasted Carrots and Celeriac

1 c black lentils

2 c water (more if using green or brown lentils)

1 large carrot, peeled and diced in ¼-inch pieces

1 few slices of celeriac, peeled and diced in ¼-inch pieces (equal amount to carrot, sprinkle with lemon juice to avoid discoloration if not roasting it right away)

Olive oil

Pinch of salt (optional)

1-2 tsp walnut oil

1 tsp sherry wine vinegar or to taste

Herbs of choice (parsley, lovage, chickweed)

Rinse the lentils and pick them over to remove any small stones. Bring the water to a boil and add the lentils. When the water returns to a boil, lower the heat and simmer the mixture, covered or partially covered, until the lentils are tender but not mushy, approximately about 25 minutes. Check partway through and add more water if necessary.

Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Place the diced carrot and celeriac on a baking sheet, sprinkle with olive oil and a little salt and roast until tender, approximately 10 minutes. Remove to a plate and keep warm.

When the lentils are cooked, drain them and add the oil and vinegar. When ready to serve, toss with the carrots, celeriac and herbs.  Serves 4 as a side dish.

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Celeriac Salad with Walnuts and Cheese

Every so often, I look back at my cooking journal to see what I was cooking a year ago, and guess what, I made two celery root salads at this time last year.  I’m sure this is because there’s a logical sequence to using up the fall harvest, starting with the perishable greens and ending with the sturdy roots. Last year I made a delicious, classic celery root rémoulade and a salad of three celeries (celeriac, Pascal celery stalks and leaves, and seeds). Those, and this year’s versions, are all great winter salads.

This year, we received a gift of delicious fresh walnuts from a California ranch and I had a bottle of walnut oil that I needed to use soon (walnut oil goes rancid quickly, so don’t wait to use it up after it’s open).  They seemed like logical pairings with the celeriac. I tried one salad with just walnuts for the dairy-free, another with crumbled blue cheese, and my favorite, a version with a gruyère-like cheese grated to roughly the dimensions of the celeriac matchsticks.

Celeriac Salad with Walnuts and Cheese

1 knob of celeriac

Juice of 1 lemon

½ tsp or less salt

Walnut oil

A few fresh walnuts, lightly toasted in a warm pan

Optional: Cheese (crumbled blue cheese or grated gruyère)

Optional: parsley

Peel the celeriac and slice it into thin matchsticks (1 ¼ inch long x just under 1/8 inch square), dropping the pieces into a bowl containing the lemon juice. Sprinkle with a little salt and set aside to soften for at least 1 hour, or even overnight.

Add the walnut oil and season to taste. Serve with the toasted walnuts and cheese.

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