A big welcome to everyone on this eighth stop on my book tour. If you’re a fan of The Alcoholian, you might know me as The Lord of the Onion Rings. If you’re a fan of me (and my blog) and you’re simply following me around the blogosphere, then welcome to JohnGL. If you even remotely like food, stick around after the tour and take a gander at some of John’s fine work.
But for now, take a gander at my work. What you’re about to witness is a wonderfully wonderful soup, just perfect for those hot summer days that are nearly upon us. Scratch that. It’s perfect for those cold winter nights what follow those hot summer days. So print this out and mark your calendars right now: “November 29, 2009. Make Charlie’s Soup.”
If I had to rate this soup on a scale of 1 to 10, I’d probably give it an eight. As much as I’d love to say this is the best potato soup you’ll ever eat, I have to be honest: I’m still working on it. I know I can do better and John, on more than one occasion, has offered to try. But I never got around to coughing up the recipe.
Which is ironic, because about ten days ago, when I decided I was running out of time and had better prepare this, I couldn’t find the bleedin’ recipe! I looked everywhere, both physically and electronically. Just when I was about to start over—tada!—I found it in an odd desk drawer where I swept away a bunch of papers in an effort to “clean the house.”
Reminds me of that line from She Blinded Me With Science.
I don’t believe it! There she goes again! She’s tidied up and I can’t find anything!
But I digress… Let’s get down to business.
First, the ingredients:
- 12 medium Russet potatoes
- 2 tablespoons of ham soup base
- 1 medium onion
- 2 stalks celery
- 2 cloves garlic
- 2 tablespoons butter
- 2 tablespoons dried parsley
- 5 cups skim milk
- 1 cup heavy whipping cream
- 1/2 cup butter
- 1/2 cup flour
- 1 tablespoon salt
- fresh ground pepper
The recipe is pretty simple:
- Peel and cube the taters.
- Sauté diced onions and celery.
- Boil the taters in eight cups of water, with ham base.
- Heat dairy products to 175 or so.
- Melt remaining butter, add flour, salt, and pepper.
- Combine dairy products with the roux.
- Pour the cream mixture into the tater pot.
From start to finish, it should take between ninety minutes and two hours. If you happen to be in a hurry at the moment, go! Go now and just start cooking. You should have all the info you need above.
On the other hand, if you’re just sitting at work right now and killing some time, read on.
Begin with a dozen potatoes. Don’t worry too much about the sizes, it all works out in the end:
Wouldn’t it be awesome if you could peel potatoes that quickly? Once they’ve been skinned, chop each potato into six or eight parts. You want to make them small enough to cook quickly but large enough to survive the journey. I recommend an eight-quart pot for this.
Next, the onion, celery, and garlic. Hoooo boy, I’m getting excited already just thinking about it. I recommend one medium onion, a couple stalks of celery, and as much garlic as you want. I use at least two cloves.
You can chop these up by hand or take the easy way out. Guess which one I chose.
Now sauté in two tablespoons of butter. I love this step. I’d be happy just chopping up onions, celery, and garlic, throwing it in a hot pan, and sautéing all the live long day. There should be a word for this.
In another pan, mix five cups of skim milk with one cup of heavy cream. Or six cups of half and half. Or whole milk. Or all skim milk. It’s really your choice. Heat this to around 175 degrees. Why? I have no idea, to be perfectly honest. John? Any thoughts?
Boil four quarts of water and add to two tablespoons of ham soup base. Or, if you happen to have four quarts of prepared stock, use that. Chicken stock would work too, but heck, you use chicken stock for everything. Use a little pig juice for a change.
Pour that over the taters and add another four cups of hot water. You should now be looking at something like this:
Bring to a boil and cook for thirty minutes. Oh, go ahead and add the onions and celery now too:
Now it’s time to melt a half cup of butter then add a half cup of flour, doing the usual panic stirring to avoid lumpage. Once it’s mixed and bubbly, add one tablespoon of salt and as much pepper as you can grind before the roux burns.
When the milk is hot and your flour hasn’t burst into flames yet, add about half the milk mixture, again with the panic stirring. (Do you have any idea how hard it is to stir flour and butter, pour milk, and take a picture at the same time?)
Once mixed, pour this new stuff back into the milk mixture.
Get out your whisk and stir until: 1) no lumps and 2) it gets thick. Be patient. If you get bored during this step, take this time to ponder why my thumb looks so huge. Or why the whisk looks so tiny. This doesn’t look like an eight quart pot. It looks like a teacup.
Next, add the Nestle butterscotch morsels.
Wait a minute. What am I talking about?! Don’t do that. Never add butterscotch morsels to your potato soup. I recommend the chocolate mint chips instead.
When the taters are good and cooked and the sauce is good and thick, put the two together, again taking care to not drop the camera in the pot.
Cook for another five minutes to two hours on low heat. Honestly, it’s about done at this point, but I’m usually busy with other things, so it generally sits on the stove at least another half hour.
Did I say done? Not a chance. Sure, you can go ahead and pour yourself a bowl right now, but it’s actually relatively bland at this point. But that’s by design because what sets Charlie’s Creamy Potato Soup above the rest is the stir-in. Bare minimum: grated cheddar cheese. My favorite is hot sauce and taco meat. Yes, taco meat. I also highly recommend chopped bacon. Use your imagination. Just don’t use butterscotch morsels.
And the damage? Pre stir-in, not too bad, actually:
This makes about a dozen twelve-ounce servings. For me, that’s three ladles: a half cup per pour. Of course, any decent stir-in will probably double these stats, but you’re still looking at a great big bowl of yummy for around 300 calories total.
Call me on November 30 and let me know what you think.
If you’re following the tour, make sure you visit The Wonderful World of Wieners tomorrow. Or stop by yesterday’s post at Ecstatic Days.
[...] the ever-popular situp. I was in the middle of working on the potato soup recipe when I decided adding more potatoes to my midsection was the last thing I [...]
I don’t know that cream can be fat-free. That just seems like an oxymoron. Somebody’s sellin’ you fish oil, Biz!
I don’t know, but it is so good! It’s very thick like heavy cream – maybe half fat free milk and half fat freen cream???!! It makes no sense but it’s really good!
If “half and half” is half milk, half cream … what the heck is “fat free” half and half?
You had me at soup – I could eat it every day of my life – summer or not!
I’ve also used fat free half and half in my soups for creaminess – works really well.
Of course the extra cheddar cheese and bacon really makes ANY potato soup!
Thanks for sharing the recipe Charlie!
I’m impressed Charlie! That looks awesome. I love tater soup.
Maybe for Christmas I’ll get you the gloves you wear to peel potatoes!
Have you seen the infomercial about them? It’s hilarious! Google it and you’ll know what I am talking about.
And, you’re right, the stats aren’t that bad!!