Potato and Rice Soup

As the cold continues, I'm in the mood for more soup. Also in the mood for something super easy after the 6 hour cassoulet! This is a soup that my grandmother used to make in Italy. My mom gave me the recipe years and years ago, while I was still in college. She claims that she never used tomato paste, and that there's parsley in it, but that's not what I have written down. Anyway, this fast, simple, but delicious soup is also very filling, and can be completely vegetarian, even vegan if you want!

Potato and Rice Soup

Olive oil (enough to coat bottom of pan)
6 cloves garlic, crushed
1/4 cup tomato paste
4 potatoes, diced
6 cups stock
6 tablespoons rice

Garlic cooking

Potatoes added

simmering away

• Heat olive oil.  Add garlic and cook till just fragrant, taking care not to burn it.  Add potatoes and tomato paste and cook for a couple of minutes.  Add stock and cook at a high simmer for 20 minutes.  Add rice and cook for 20 more minutes, stirring occasionally.  Smash about half of the potatoes and rice with a fork or a potato masher.  Serve with some grated parmigiano reggiano.

I hab a code id by dose

Picked up a pesky little cold on the plane, so keeping the cooking simple for now.  Simple and tasty.  Luckily, mom has so much food in the house that I have yet to even think about going to the store.  Yesterday, a package arrived with two frozen Poulet Rouge.  If you've never heard of it, you're not alone.  This is a special breed of chicken that is soooo tasty!  The chickens that most Americans are familiar with are Cornish chickens.  These birds have been bred to satisfy the demand for more breast meat.  The result is an in-bred, weird chicken that behaves in a bizarre manner, including pecking at other chickens, and getting its head stuck sideways for no reason.  You can simply snap the head back into alignment and the bird goes about on his merry way.  Even most organic, free range, pastured, and otherwise politically correct birds are this breed.  Big boobed chickens.  While there is nothing showing that these chickens are in any way unhealthy to eat, the in-breeding freaks me out a bit.  Yes, I generally eat them anyway because I'm not yet independently wealthy, but sometimes I wonder....

The Poulet Rouge Fermier (which in French, means red chicken) is what our grandmothers knew chicken to be.  It is a slow growing Heritage breed with thin skin and an elongated breast.  There is a whole Label Rouge program in France certifying them... I won't go into that here.  You can order them online from http://www.joycefoods.com/, or from Amazon.  In the SF area, Riverdog farms grows these birds, but they are sometimes hard to find in stores.  And they are not cheap.  I found one at Avedano's a while back for $6/pound.  At an average of 3lbs, that's an $18 chicken!  

But I digress.  We put one of the chickens in the freezer, and set the other in the fridge to defrost for tonight.  With some nice roasted potatoes and carrots, we had a delicious dinner in about an hour.

For the chicken:

1 Poulet Rouge Chicken
4 tbsp butter
1 lemon
1/2 onion
about 10 sage leaves

• Salt chicken, inside and out.  
• Mix room temperature butter and chopped sage.  Make a little pocket under the skin and put some of the butter between the breast and the skin.  Rub the remaining butter all over the outside of the chicken.  
• Cut up lemon and onion and put in cavity.  Tie legs closed with kitchen twine.

All buttered up!

• Cook at 450 in convection oven for about 15 minutes, then lower heat to 400 till done (about an hour…till temp in the thigh reaches 160).
• Let rest for 5 minutes

Resting chicken...ahhhh.....

For potatoes and carrots:

2 lb red potato

3 carrots

2 tbsp Olive Oil

1 tbsp Rosemary, Fresh

Salt

• Peel and cut potatoes and carrots.  Place in roasting pan.  Toss with olive oil, salt, and rosemary.

Potatoes and carrots ready for the oven

• Roast the potatoes uncovered for about 45 min to 1 hour. (Just put in oven with the chicken) Stir the potatoes occasionally during the cooking time, cook until crisp, lightly browned and tender. 

Beef Stew

Rainy San Francisco days call for stew (even if my father doesn't like stews - sorry Father!). Perfect for when you are house bound for hours, a stew will warm up the house and fill it with wonderful slow-cooked smells. Not the best photo, and I forgot to picture the piece of cornbread that went with it, but you get the idea.

Beef Stew

Prep time: 30 minutes. Cook time: 3 hours

2 1/2 lbs cubed chuck roast
4 tbsp. olive oil
2 tbsp. butter
1 bag frozen pearl onions
6 carrots, cut into 1" pieces (more or less)
6 cloves garlic, crushed
3 tbsp. tomato paste
3 tbsp. flour
1/2 bottle good quality red wine
4 cups organic beef broth
1 bay leaf
2 sprigs rosemary
4 russet potatoes, cut into 1 1/2" pieces (more or less)
1 cup frozen peas
salt & pepper to taste

• Heat oil and butter in a large, heavy pan over medium high heat. Season beef with salt and pepper and brown, working in batches (if you crowd the beef, it will steam), about 15 minutes. As pieces are browned on both sides, remove to a plate.
• When all beef is browned, remove all but 2 tbsp. of the butter and oil, add onions and carrots, sprinkle with a bit of salt, and cook for about 5-7 minutes till nicely browned. Add garlic and cook for about a minute more. Add tomato paste and cook for about 2 minutes.
• Return browned beef to pan, along with any accumulated juices. Sprinkle with flour, stir, and cook for 1-2 minutes.
• Add wine, broth, bay leaf, rosemary, and about 1 tbsp of salt. Bring to a simmer, then reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer very slowly for about an hour and a half.
• Add potatoes and continue to cook uncovered for about an hour and a half. About 5 minutes before it's done, add peas.
• Serve with corn bread, or a crusty bread to soak up juices.

Serves 6

As with most stews, this is even better the next day, and will freeze very well too.