[magkelly]

(Feel free to add your own....)

I'll start with my absolute favorite and add one now and again for you to enjoy....

When I was a kid working my first job and for many years after I used to stop into Denny's to grab their beef veggie soup and an order of FF for lunch. I'm a major soup fan all round so long as it's homemade not canned. Only canned soups I'll touch (and that's actually only for making certain time honored recipes of my Mom's like green bean casserole at Thanksgiving) are the Creamed Chicken and Tomato Bisque from Campbell's. (Not generics. I won't touch generics of these two, period.) Otherwise I make my own in batches and freeze it in individual serving cups. Since I was a kid I've loved that particular soup of Denny's though.

A few years ago they cut making it back to 2 days a week, then they also started routinely putting more water into their soups at Denny's. Between that and the news stories about the disturbing racial discrimination apparently going on inside some Denny's, well, I just finally decided that getting my favorite soup 2X a week just wasn't worth going there. But darn, I really missed my soup! So I resolved that I was going to break down that soup, figure out what they use in it and make my own version of it. You'd be surprised but it actually took me several years to finally get there. No, no recipes I found online even came close. This is my version, and actually it's even a bit better than Denny's I think, a bit more upscale, but it's WAY closer than any version I've ever seen.

You'll need a big pot for this one:

1/16 oz can beef broth, 1/16 oz can of all vegetable broth
8 oz can of crushed tomatoes (I use Pommi, the carton ones....)

a good veggie mix including corn, baby lima beans, green beans, carrots, and peas (Note: I don't use the cheap cubed versions for this. I like to use fresh, but any upscale version of this mix frozen would do you, and yes, it does matter. Tastes a whole heck better with good veggies! NO, it does not have anything like broccoli, cauliflower or asparagus in there. Or squash. Denny's doesn't, and besides which you put those in a veggie soup it tastes quite different! I can't stop you, but I definitely don't want to know about it if you do! ;P )

1 cup quick barley
1lb of ground beef cooked and drained (I use ground round actually....)
Fresh crushed garlic in olive oil, 1 tsp
About a tablespoon of chopped fresh onion (I usually put this and the garlic in with the meat as I brown the meat.)
Cracked pepper to taste
Kosher salt to taste
A pinch or two of thyme, rosemary and sage.

Brown the meat, garlic, onion put aside. Put the broth in the pot, add the crushed tomatoes and simmer to a low boil. Add the barley and the meat and simmer for about half an hour on low. Add the veggies, cook for about another half hour, again on a fairly low setting until the veggies are as soft as you generally like them. At that point you'd also add in the seasonings. The key to this soup is keeping it all on a low temperature and not overcooking the veggies. The half beef and half veggie broth plus the tomatoes makes for a nice flavor mix versus straight beef broth, though sometimes I do add a bit of water and some more beef flavoring as I finish it off to make it a bit more beefy. I use the "Better Than Bouillon" beef stuff at this point but you can just add another half a can of broth or two or 2 bouillon cubes.

Depends upon how much liquid the barley soaks up. Sometimes you don't need the additional liquid, sometimes you do. I always use the quick barley but each batch seems a bit different, shrug. If you want to get fancy a little squeeze of sun dried tomato paste added to the soup at the end makes for a nice extra bit of rich flavor though I doubt the folks at Denny's ever thought of that one. Lastly the ground beef versus say beef chunks is part of what makes this the Denny's style veggie soup. It will taste very different actually with beef chunks. No less good but the ground beef thing does give it a certain taste and texture that using beef chunks does not. Oh and don't use the regular barley if you can help it. Stuff takes hours to cook right, and sometimes never does. I never mess with that kind. It's way too much hassle.

Next up Minestrone (ala MK) with beef and ground Italian sausage or maybe my Yankee Bean and Ham soup, which isn't my Mama's tame version....

---

Last edited by magkelly; 05-16-2012 at 12:01 PM.

[jpzk]

Looks like a winner!

Although not a real soup "fan", I enjoy it for a simpler meal full of flavours!

I just named you the Soup Guru 2012 !

By the way ... do you remember this:

You Tube

You Tube

Cheers!

JP

[RioRico]

I'm a big fan of stone soup.

[magkelly]

Yup. I'm not a huge Seinfeld fan but I used to live near there, also near Tom's diner which you also saw a lot on certain NYC based comedy shows. That's where I had my first good bowl of lentil soup ever. I'd never even seen a lentil before then. My Dad loathes most legumes but particularly peas, lentils and lima beans so my Mom never really made them. She ultimately even gave up making baby lima beans with bacon which I actually love. My Dad would make a face just seeing them on the table. Tom's lentil was so good I became a fixture there. That and FF that's I ate usually after my 7 mile walks to work and back. I make several types of lentil soup now, most notably Golden Lentil, but I'm still fond of making it Tom's style. Actually I'm just finishing up a pot of 3 bean chili con carne soup as I type. Most of that is getting frozen. But I'll have a little tomorrow for lunch. Soup has to sit for a night in the fridge, IMHO, to be really good.

[wildweasel]

My favourite is an old Scottish recipe, oatmeal soup. It takes almost no time at all to make - around 15 minutes.

For two.

Finely chop an onion and some garlic to taste, and fry in a good sized knob of butter on a high heat until starting to go translucent with a few brown bits here and there,

Then reduce heat to medium, and add a good handful of fine oatmeal. I usually use porridge oats that I chop to approx. 1mm, and lightly brown. Next add about 300ml of chicken or vegetable stock (12 oz) and bring to the boil, reduce, and simmer for 3-4 mins. Marigold bouillon is good for this. Add a splash of milk, and some herbs if you like - parsley is nice - and it's ready.

It has a surprisingly complex flavour and is really rich and creamy. You can add any spices or herbs you like, fennel and caraway are good, as is chilli. But then, chilli is always good...

[magkelly]

That's got to be a first for me. I don't think I've ever heard of that one. Oatmeal soup? Wow....

[Unsinkable II]

I went ahead and made the oatmeal soup. Surprisingly creamy.

Here is a free (as of the time of writing) Kindle soup recipe book:

Amazon.com: SPOON: Soup, Stew & Chowder Recipes (Spring/Summer) (Cooking in Season #1) eBook: Maria Herb, Dana Hay: Kindle Store

[magkelly]

I'm making ham and white bean tomorrow. Got to finish up my veggie beef first. But likely I'll be doing ham and white bean before the weekend. It's been very hot here, 90 degrees all week though and mostly I don't want anything hot to eat. I don't tend to like cold soups though so I don't eat as much soup this time of year. I'm a fruit and salad lover in the summer.

[RioRico]

Soup? That's for winter. Fine now in Oz, no good in California. Maybe cold soup here. Chicken broth with avocado and whole-wheat pasta, I could gag that down. Otherwise it's sandwich season.

[Unsinkable II]

I'm making ham and white bean tomorrow. Got to finish up my veggie beef first. But likely I'll be doing ham and white bean before the weekend. It's been very hot here, 90 degrees all week though and mostly I don't want anything hot to eat. I don't tend to like cold soups though so I don't eat as much soup this time of year. I'm a fruit and salad lover in the summer.

One of my favourite soups ever I had recently in Bohol... white bean with a chorizo mousse... wow!

But there's nowt wrong with a cold gazpacho in summer. The same place did a great version with green tomatoes. That was a first for me, but the best gazpacho I've ever had was on a flat plate, where the sides of the bowl were made from overlapping cucumber slices! Wonderful. Was in a little town outside of Seville, overlooking the town square.

I guess it's easy to tell I'm a bit of a soup fan! Nowt better for a hangover than a tasty liquid full of vitamins and minerals.

[RioRico]

We were just at the local dentist's for crown-replacement prep. Ouch. Many painkillers but never enough. And no chewy-crunchy food tonight. So I whopped up a sopa de lenteyas, lentil soup. Easy: chop a couple little potatoes, some onion, carrot, pepper, etc. Chop some sausage and/or boneless chicken and/or whatever desired flavorful protein. Saute all that; add about 2 cups / 200g of lentils and 1 quart / liter of water or broth, simmer forever, and mix in some plain yogurt to cream it. Season to taste. Nothing hard to bite down on, no pain, oh joy oh joy.

[mikemike]

I cooked a big pot of Pho all night last night and it is ready to eat right now but I wasn't able to try this morning because the baby wouldn't let me put her down for even a few minutes.

Stuff thats going into the pot:
~6 lbs of beef bones
1 big onion (roasted)
2 big daikons
Star anise
Coriander (whole)
Caraway
Cinnamon (whole)
Nuoc Mam (fish sauce)

Stuff thats going to be served/garnished in the bowl:
2 Onions, sliced thin
2 Shallots, sliced thin
2 Bunches of green onions, sliced thin
Fresh Basil
Bean Sprouts ~1 lbs

Pho Noodles (these will be in the fridge at an ethnic market)

Raw Beef (I use chuck tender sliced thin)
Vietnamese Meatballs (also in the fridge/freezer at the ethnic market)
Tripe

Hoisin sauce
Sriracha sauce

Procedure:

1. Clean the bones - use an 8 quart stock pot, put all the bones in here and fill with enough water to cover the bones, cook on medium-high heat for about 30 minutes, water should just barely start to boil, turn off heat and let them soak for about 20-30 more minutes. Then dump the water and the bones, and wash them off with warm water
   
2. Transfer the bones to the big pot - clean your 8 quart stock pot or use another one and fill it with the water as high as it was needed to cover the bones in the previous step, dump that in the big pot and repeat once - you now have the perfect amount of water for cooking. Start cooking on medium-high until the water comes to a boil then reduce the temperature slightly
   
3. Prep and skim - now is a good time to roast the onion just put it directly on a burner and turn it occasionally until all the skin is charred than remove the skin, wash it and cut a cross into it so that more of it is exposed, peel the daikon slice it into lengths about the size of your hand and half or quarter those lengths depending on the thickness, break up the cinnamon and star anise and put the spices into an infuser cage (I use 2 that are about the size of a fist they are a fine steel mesh that locks so that the spices' flavors can be released without them getting into the soup). While you are doing all this prep work, skim solids that are floating up from the bones.
   
4. Put everything on the "stuff thats going into the pot" list except for the nuoc mam into the pot - pretty self explanatory
   
5. Cover and cook for at least 5 hours on low heat - hurry up and wait after a few hours the soup will have a rich yellow color and a powerful aroma from the spices. At some point during this period you can go ahead and slice up all of those onions and the beef. It is good to put the beef in some olive oil, a little lime juice, and black pepper so that it will be tenderized, flavored, and preserved. Slice the meatballs in half or thirds. Boil the tripe in water with a little salt.
   
6. Add the nuoc mam and bring back up to a boil - Add this to taste, I usually use between 2.5-3.5 ladles of fish sauce for batch of this size adding one ladle at a time, letting it mix in for a few minutes, and tasting before adding more. Once you have the proper amount of sauce in, you can turn off the flame.
   
7. Cook the noodles - there should be instructions on the package but the one I get is vacuum packed in a pink colored wrapper and each package makes enough noodles for 4-5 bowls. Boil some water in a kettle, put the noodles in a big mixing bowl, dump the hot water on it, swish for about 30 seconds, and dump the noodles into a colander and flush with cool water to prevent them from being overcooked
   
8. Ready to serve - put the noodles, onions/shallots/green onions, and bean sprouts, and tripe into your bowl, put the raw beef on top. Put the soup for your bowl into a small pot and boil with the meatballs bring it to a full boil and pour into your bowl to cook the beef.

Other things that some people like but I don't personally are putting a piece of ginger, rock sugar, or MSG into the pot and serving with tendon, brisket, or flank steak. This recipe will make 12-16 bowls so in general you can cut it in half using 3 lbs of bones, 1 daikon, a medium sized onion, and 1 infuser cage of spices but this is a lot of work to do for a smaller batch.