Home-made soup is so much tastier and more nutritious than soup from a can. Once you have made a batch, it is just as convenient to warm it over as it is to prepare canned soup. Some can be made in half an hour or less. Others need more time than attention and can simmer on the stove or in a slow cooker all day, often after fairly little preparation. It can be part of saving money on food while saving your health and the planet.
Soups with thin broths
I had some wonderful soup in a restaurant one time. I commented on it to the waiter and said I didn’t suppose I could ever find out how to make it. The next thing I knew, the chef was at my table telling me that he just browned some garlic and onions in some olive oil and then filled the pot with water and let it simmer. Other ingredients could be anything else I could think of. Season to taste with salt and whatever other spices capture your fancy.
If I recall correctly, that particular soup had only fresh spinach and fresh diced tomatoes added. Basil or other Italian spice would make a good seasoning for that. Any number of other ingredients can make an equally good light soup course, although to my taste, fresh mushrooms give the broth an unappetizing color.
That same simple technique can also be used to make a vegetable soup hearty enough for a meal if it has plenty of filling vegetables like potatoes, turnips, or rutabagas, along with carrots, green beans, etc. Just be careful to add quick-cooking vegetables like peas or summer squash only after the longer-cooking vegetables are almost ready to eat. If you want to add noodles, tortellini, or other pasta, be sure not to overcook them. If you add rice or other grains (besides quick-cooking barley), they should be cooked first. There is no point in adding meat to this soup. The olive oil provides plenty of fat and flavor.
Otherwise, making, say, a vegetable-beef soup requires the same technique; just omit the olive oil. Put the meat, onions, garlic, and vegetables into a pot or slow cooker and fill it with water. This kind of soup must not only cook slowly, but for a long time to make sure the beef is tender. My mother always uses stew meat. I prefer to add something with bones in order to add calcium to the soup. Neck bones are inexpensive, but very difficult to get all the bones out before serving. Little pieces of sharp bone in a bowl of soup are dangerous. Short ribs are a little more expensive, but much easier to use. Their only problem is occasional gristle close to the bone.
Although I have never made a vegetable soup with pork or lamb, there is no reason why these meats could not make a delicious soup. They still need to be cooked slowly for a long time—especially to make sure that pork is thoroughly cooked.
It may be necessary to de-fat the broth before serving. If you are making the soup one day to serve it the next, the fat will rise to the top and congeal in the refrigerator. Simply remove it and discard it. If you plan to serve the soup the same day, you can use a defatting pitcher, which has its spout coming off the bottom rather than the top. Plastic ones crack eventually. I have had my glass one for years.
I do not advocate adding chicken or other poultry with bones in the same way. Instead, make a broth with the carcass of a bird you have had for another meal. (Or, buy broth at the grocery.) Even a turkey or chicken that looks like it has been picked clean can still make a delicious broth. Tarragon is a nice seasoning.
Once it is strained and de-fatted, use it for a soup with leftover meat from the bird and whatever other ingredients (vegetables, cooked grains, pasta) you feel like using. Or, you can bring the broth to a full boil when the other ingredients are thoroughly cooked and pour in some beaten raw eggs, the technique used to make Chinese Egg Flower Soup. The eggs will cook instantly when they hit the boiling broth.
Low-fat cream soups
This heading sounds like an oxymoron, except you will not use cream in any of them. For a cream of chicken soup, make soup with broth as above. Bring it to a boil after everything else is ready. Thicken it slightly with, say ¼ cup of water and 1 T. of cornstarch for every pint of broth. Then add a can of evaporated milk—or two if you’re using a really large pot.
For cream of mushroom soup, chop the mushrooms and sauté them in 1 T. of butter or olive oil for every cup of soup you intend to make. Add 1 T. of flour to make a roux, then add milk a little at a time. In other words, it is just like making gravy, except you use half the amount of fat and flour so that the result will be a soup-like consistency instead of thick like gravy.
For cream of celery or broccoli or spinach or potato, etc., chop the vegetables into suitably small pieces and cook them in water. Reserve the cooking water and add instant milk powder to it. Using that instead of regular milk, proceed as above with the oil and flour. Of course, if you don’t like the color of the resulting soup, you can discard the cooking water and just use milk, but you’ll be throwing away good vitamins.
I used to make potato soup that way, but now make it differently. I cut the potatoes into small pieces and cook them. When they are done, I take out half of them with a slotted spoon and set them aside. I put the rest, along with the cooking water and instant milk powder, into a food processor and liquefy it. If it’s too thick, I add some milk; if it’s too thin, I add some instant mashed potatoes—a very little at a time! Pour the soup back into the pot, add the reserved potatoes, and season to taste. Any number of things can be added: chopped onions and garlic (which should go into the food processor), bacon bits and/or corn (which should not)—etc!
For a delicious cream of cabbage with barley soup, cook ½ cup quick-cooking barley in 2 cups of broth (any kind, including water with bouillon). In a larger pan sauté garlic, chopped onions, and cabbage in 4 T of oil or butter. I use olive oil and half a bag of shredded coleslaw. When the cabbage has begun to soften, add 6 T of flour and slowly stir in 2 cups of milk. In other words, you will be making a thicker than usual white sauce with the cooked cabbage. When that is finished and the barley is done, pour the barley and all of the broth into the cabbage mixture. Stir it together and season to taste. I like to top the bowls of soup with bacon bits.
Bean soups
I always use a slow cooker for these, but they can just as well be done on the stove. Most soup beans must be soaked over night. Discard the water in the morning before proceeding to prepare the soup. It is not necessary to presoak split peas or lentils.
Put the beans in the pot along with chopped onions, sliced carrots, and whatever meat you want. (I like beef with lentil soup and ham or pork with the others.) Add water to cover and cook everything slowly until the beans are soft and tender. When everything is cooked, if you used soup bones of any kind, take them out to get the meat off of them. De-fat the broth. Let the soup come to a boil (or turn the slow cooker to high). Mix some water, corn starch, and seasonings together and pour it into the soup, both to thicken it and to bind any remaining fat.
