Chelsea gets Soupy

Yo, Soup's Up!

So you would think that on sweltering hot, Guyana nights you would not want to eat hot foods, right? But for some reason, I have been on a serious soup kick recently. Soup is just so easy to make. Usually you only need one pot and sometimes a blender and it is a great way to use up some of those random items sitting on your shelf. A while ago, I was way too tired to go shopping and so we decided to make soup from whatever we had in our house. This is what my Oma used to do with her leftovers and it used to freak me out. Does this mean I am getting old? Anyway, it was delicious!

And so this week, Tim and I made two new soups: Black Bean and Chicken Potato Peanut. These soups are inspired from recipes on EatingWell.com and modified to use Guyanese ingredients. Enjoy them with something cheesy for us, like quesadillas or grilled cheese sandwiches.

Oma-Inspired Left Over Soup (plus homemade Chicken Stock)

For the ingredient list I will not give you measurements, since we didn’t measure. We just used about equal portions of everything that we had in tupperwares in our mini fridge.

· Homemade chicken broth

· Macaroni noodles, cooked

· Black eye beans, cooked

· 2 carrots, cut into bite sized pieces

· 4 small sweet peppers, chopped

· ½ can corn

· 1 small yellow onion

· dashes of salt, oregano, basil, chili powder, Spike, and sugar

· you can seriously add anything else in here; chicken, potato, milk to make it creamy…you are

only limited by your creativity and supplies in your pantry. The challenge is though to use only left

overs…

First you need a broth. So, never in my life did I think I was going to be boiling left over chicken parts in water every 6 hours to make a homemade broth but I found that it was a great way to use the bones and skin of the chicken that we would otherwise have thrown away (I miss boneless, skinless chicken breasts by the way…). And you can’t exactly find premade chicken or vegetable broth in the stores here. Either way, you’ll need some broth. Here’s what we did:

Start with left over chicken parts in a pot of water. Use a bit more water than you want to make broth, since it will evaporate. Add some salt, black pepper and seasonings and bring to a boil. Cover and leave on the stove. Bring to a boil about every six hours or so, until you are ready to make soup. I usually boil it once in the evening, early the next morning, right when I get home from work and then lastly when I make the soup. Strain out yucky chicken bits and fat and, TA-DA you have a broth!

Bring the broth to a boil and add all of the above ingredients. Simmer for about 5 minutes and enjoy your left over soup! Thanks Oma!

Black Bean Soup

• 1 tablespoon cooking oil
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 1 tablespoon chili powder
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1 pint black beans
• 3 cups water
• 1 small can of Hernanz hot salsa sent from home by Mom
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 fresh squeezed lime

Soak beans for at least 6 hours. Put beans in pressure pot with enough water to fully submerge beans and pressure for 25 minutes or until soft.

Heat oil in kahari. Add onion and cook until beginning to soften. Add chili powder and cumin and stir for about another minute. Add cooked beans, water, salsa and salt. Bring to a boil; reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes. Remove from the heat and stir in lime juice.

Transfer half the soup to a blender and puree (umm, don’t hold the blender lid without a towel on top to protect your had from freakin’ hot liquid. I learned this the hard way). Stir the puree back into the saucepan.

Chicken Potato Peanut Soup

• 1 small yellow onion, chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 teaspoon cooking oil
• 1 can v8 tomato/veggie juice
• 2 teaspoons minced fresh ginger
• 1 dried habanero chile, minced
• a dash or two of Spike seasoning
• 1 vegetable bullion cube in 1 ½ cups hot water to make broth
• 1 cup smooth peanut butter
• 3 chicken breasts, cut into bite sized pieces

Peel potatoes and cut into bite sized pieces. Boil until soft. Set aside to cool.

Prepare broth by heating water and adding bullion cube. Put broth, half the cooked potatoes and peanut butter into blender and puree until smooth.

In your kahari (because by now you have this Guyanese stew pot like we do, right?) heat oil and sautee chicken, onion, garlic, ginger and habanero chile with a dash of Spike until chicken is almost cooked. Add can of V8 and bring to a boil. Add half the cooked potatoes into the kahari then slowly mix in the peanut, broth, potato mix from the blender. Enjoy your delicious soup.