serafina.us

Preparation time: 10 min

Cooking time: 30 min

Ingredients:

Octopus, of course! (several whole octopuses)

Potato (1)

Celery (1)

Carrot (1/2)

Onion bits

Garlic bits

Basil

Cayenne pepper

Heavy cream

Olive oil

Chicken bullion cubes (2)

Directions:

1. Cut up celery and carrots, and sautee with olive oil and onion bits for a few minutes.

2. Add 4 cups of water. Cut up potato and add as well. Cut up the octupuses (this is the fun part! I cut mine while they were still frozen because otherwise they felt too alive). Add octopuses to pot. Bring to a boil.

3. Add chicken bullion cubes. Also add basil, garlic, and cayenne pepper. Cook for about 20 minutes.

4. Add heavy cream. Bring to a boil again. Done!

Good thing for spell check…

I’ve browsed over a bunch of online recipes before making this one, and mixed and matched the ingredients. For some reason, many recipes out there include bits of chicken (isn’t this a vegetarian soup?), as well as apples (I wasn’t about to venture out there). None of that here. Also, I decided as always to be more generous with my ingredients, so this soup is meant to be much spicier and heartier than in other recipes online. Two notes: first, the below proportions are just approximations. I don’t really use measuring cups and spoons much, and I find it more enjoyable to use different proportions each time so that every time I make the same thing it tastes just a little different; and second, …. oh I forgot the second point. I’m sure it wasn’t important. So without further adieu, I present my Mulligatawny soup recipe!

Time Commitment:

20 min preparation; 45 min cooking (approximately)

Ingredients:

carrot – 1/2

celery – 1 stick

red Thai chili peppers – 4 (use only 1 if you don’t want the soup to be too spicy)

olive oil – 2-4 Tsp

red lentils – 1-2 cups

flour – approx 1/8 – 1/4 cup

chopped onion – 4 Tsp (I use the seasoning, not the actual onion)

curry powder – 4 Tsp

chicken bullion cubes – 2

water – 4 cups

tomato juice – 1 cup

heavy cream – 1 cup

salt and black pepper (to taste)

cayenne pepper – 1 Tsp

parsley – 2 Tsp

Basmati rice – 1 cup

Directions:

1. Chop up celery and carrots into tiny pieces (minced); remove seeds from chili peppers and chop up as well (might want to use gloves for the peppers; they got on the inside of my fingernails and are still burning… doh!).

2. Saute celery, carrots, onions, and peppers in olive oil and curry powder for 5 minutes.

3. In separate pot, cook the Basmati rice (takes about 20 minutes).

4. Add 4 cups of water to the pot in which vegetables were sauteed. Add lentils. Bring to boil.

5. Add chicken bullion cubes. Add flour. Turn down heat and simmer for 20 minutes.

6. Add tomato juice, salt and pepper, cayenne pepper, and heavy cream. Return to a boil.

7. Add rice and parsley. Done!

This is much heartier than plain old Miso soup, tastier, and still very fast and easy to make. The only trick here is finding an Asian supermarket that carries the ingredients. I went to H-Mart in Virginia. I’m sure plenty of markets in China Town in Manhattan carry these ingredients as well. And it’s worth getting them, because they can last for many, many servings (weeks), and the ingredients that won’t last that long (e.g. tofu) can be bought anywhere.

Here’s the recipe:

Preparation time: 5 minutes

Cooking time: 5 minutes

Ingredients:

Tofu (firm)

Scallions

Seaweed (the dried stuff that you put into water and it expands)

Miso paste

Pickled radish

Cayenne pepper (optional – I like things spicy)

The key ingredient, as you may have been able to tell, is the pickled radish. Without it, this is just Miso soup. But that pickled radish is SOOOO delicious. The first time I discovered it was when I worked by Rockefeller Center and went across the street for lunch to get this Udon soup. It always had some yellow stuff in it, and I had no idea what it was, but it made me just so happy. I even went there on a weekend, just for that soup and that yellow stuff.

This was in 2005, and only now, four years later, I finally found out what that “secret” ingredient was, and bought it at H-Mart. But the next dilemma I faced was: what am I going to do with it? After snacking away at it slowly while it was in my fridge for a week, I finally added it to some homemade Miso soup, and I haven’t gone back since. Gooood stuff that pickled radish.

Directions:

1. Put a few cups of water to boil.

2. While water is boiling, place seaweed in a bowl and add just enough water to cover the seaweed.

3. Then, cut up the tofu, pickled radish, and scallions. Add to water. The key here to making the soup hearty is to add lots of seaweed and pickled radish.

4. When water has boiled, add a spoonful of miso paste (and cayenne pepper if you want it spicy). Stir, so that the miso paste dissolves.

5. When miso paste has dissolved, remove from heat, add seaweed, and eat!

I got lazy this time around and bought a bag of frozen mixed seafood. It still came out pretty good, and in any case I don’t think I can cut up another octopus for a while after my last attempt a few weeks ago when the ink suddenly squirted out while I was cutting it. And those eyes staring at me. ANYWAY, with the bag of seafood ready to be thrown into the pot, I managed to make this soup pretty quickly, and it came out delicious… then again, if it didn’t, I suppose I wouldn’t put the recipe up. ANYWAY, here it is:

Preparation time: 5 minutes

Cooking time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

Water (I used 10 cups for a very big pot)

Vegetable bullion cube (2)

Milk (~1 cup)

Butter (2 Tsp)

Seasonings: salt, red pepper, cayenne pepper, peppercorns, bay leaf, garlic powder, chopped onions, cajun seasoning, steamed seafood seasoning, thyme, hot sauce *I tend to like to add a lot of seasonings, but the important ones I would say are cayenne pepper, garlic, cajun seasoning, hot sauce, thyme

Fresh basil

Seafood mix I used a bag of frozen seafood that had shrimp, octopus, and mussels

Vegetables Potato, corn (I use frozen corn because I'm lazy like that), red pepper, tomato

Directions:

1. Bring water in pot to a boil.

2. While water is heating up, cup up the vegetables and put them into the pot.

3. When water has boiled, add the bullion cubes.

4. Let cook for 10 minutes. Then add all the seasonings. I am very generous with the red pepper, cayenne pepper, cajun seasoning, and garlic. As for everything else, don’t put in too much because the taste of the spices will be too strong. Also add the basil leaves. I added the whole leaves, not cutting them up.

5. Another 5 minutes later, add the seafood mix.

6. In another 5 minutes, add the milk and butter. Bring to a boil again, and you’re done!

These are the best ones I made! They take a while to make, but totally worth it. One is enough to be a meal, so making 4-6 can last several days. Here’s the recipe:

Preparation time: ~1 hour

Cooking time: 40 min.

Ingredients:

Green bell peppers – I use 4-6 each time

Couscous – I used the one with roasted garlic

Ground beef

Seasonings: salt, black pepper, red pepper, cayenne pepper, garlic powder, chopped onions, poultry seasoning

1. Make the couscous (instructions are on the box – but basically boil water, spices in the box, and oil, then add couscous, turn off heat, cover, and wait 5 minutes.

2. While couscous is being made, carve out the inside of the peppers:

Use a knife to carve out the "hat."

Pull out the "hat" (be careful when you do that; once it fell inside the pepper and it was hell trying to get it out).

Use a small spoon to scrape out the rest of the inside of the pepper. Then wash the inside of the pepper with water to get out all the little seeds.

3. Mix ground beef, couscous, and seasonings in a large bowl. I used one package of meat and half a box of couscous for 4 peppers. The meat to couscous ratio should not be 1:1; that is, make sure the peppers are meaty. As for seasonings, I add a LOT of everything, making the meat very spicy. The flavor of the seasonings gets lost when the meat is cooked, so you really have to make sure that the meat is well seasoned. Also, don’t use the big couscous, use the little ones. I have used both and the little ones are much, much better.

4. Using a small spoon, fill the peppers with the mixture of meat and couscous. If you have too much meat, just try to pack it all into the peppers. You can use slices of tomato to cover the top of the pepper, or not use a cover at all.

5. Place the peppers in a large pot (in fact, I put peppers into the pot at the beginning to see how many will fit, so that I don’t carve out and stuff extra ones. However, if you have too few peppers and they seem like they will fall, put something in the pot to keep them standing. I put in a baking pan). Put water into the pot such that about 3/4 of the peppers are filled with water, and cook on stovetop. If too much of the water boils out, periodically add more.

6. Cook peppers for about 40 minutes. Serve with tomato sauce – heated in pan beforehand. I used a 4 cheeses flavored tomato sauce – came out pretty good. Enjoy!

I’ll see how long this idea lasts… but I have been cooking more often than usual lately, and in particular I’ve been trying new things (that’s right, I’ve been adding more than garlic, basil, and hot sauce to everything).

So perhaps I’ll now post my new recipes here.  I apologize for the photo quality, but if there’s one thing that’s kept me from posting on my website more frequently, it’s the task of uploading the photos. But, this problem is now solved, as I will just take photos with my phone and email them to myself. No more attaching the camera to the USB chord to the computer, transfering the photos, adjusting the size of the image, ejecting the camera…

But I digress. Here’s a recipe for some yummy mushroom soup I just made. Oh, a very important note about my recipes. I don’t use measurements. After all, it really depends on taste. If you like garlic, then add more of it; if you don’t, then don’t. Try the soup while it’s cooking and make adjustments.

I also don’t really keep track of cooking time (maybe I will from now on). I just take the ingredient that needs to reach a certain texture, and taste it to see if it has done so (for example, in this case, I took out a piece of a potato to see if it was soft – if soft, then soup is ready).

So here are the ingredients, and how much I added of each:

Preparation time: 10 minutes

Cooking time: 25-25 minutes

Ingredients:

water – 4 cups

celery – 1 stick

potato – 1

mushrooms – 2 types: 2 oyster king mushrooms, and about 4-5 of those regular mushrooms, the white ones (champion?) – but feel free to experiment

butter – about 1 tablesppon

milk (skim) – 1-2 cups

chicken bullion cube – 1

seasonings: thyme, parsley, garlic powder, chopped onions (also in the little spices bottle because I don’t like the texture of real onions – actually, when I say seasonings, I mean the ingredients in the little seasoning bottles. Feel free to use fresh thyme, parsley, etc.), black pepper (LOTS of it), peppercorns, salt

What to do:

Boil 4 cups of water. While water is heating up to be boiled, chop up and add potato, celery, mushrooms.

Once water has boiled, add the bullion cube. (Because I added 1 cube for 4 cups of water, I supplement with salt. You can do the same, or just add another cube).

About 10 minutes later, add all the seasonings.

Another 5 minutes later, add the butter and milk. Then start tasting and checking that potato, and when the potato is soft, the soup is ready! Mine is getting cold, so I’m going to go eat it now. Oh yeah, and those 4 cups can serve about 4 people. So the rest of mine is going in the fridge. One final afterthought: I added skim milk and butter; if you want yours creamier, add flour in addition to the milk and butter, or add heavy cream. I didn’t in order to “save” on the calories, and it still tastes pretty good, I think. If you make the soup, let me know how it came out!