Adrift in a Sea of Tomatoes

Garden season really got off to a bang here with a cucumber crop which was the stuff of legends.  Apparently cucumber plants like hot weather, because it had been hotter than the pits of Hades around here, and they were thriving.  I'm glad someone likes it.  I've made pickles and relish twice already, neither of which I eat, but there were just too many fresh cucumbers to keep up with.  Then came the squash bugs.  Those jerks have nearly killed my zucchini plant after only getting 3 zucchinis from it, and you know that's some quick devastation since a mature plant will grow 3 zucchinis in about 5 minutes.  (Or, at least it seems that way.)  Then they started going after the cucumbers.  We're fighting back as best we can, but those little bastards are pretty proficient, so our cucumber days may be winding down prematurely. 

Luckily the tomato harvest is really picking up steam.  I have MANY tomato plants this year, because a lot of little volunteer plants came up and I was too much of a softy to rip them all out.  Eating a fresh tomato plain, all by itself, does not interest me in the least.  (It's a texture thing.)  But cooking and preserving tomatoes is my jam.  Salsa, seasoned tomato sauce, roasted tomato slices, etc....the sky is the limit.  Today, tomatoes were taking over my kitchen counter.  I needed to take action, and I decided on tomato soup.

The way I've made cream of tomato soup for years (on my other blog here) is labor intensive.  It makes an amazing soup; a rich, complex, bisque-like bowl of hearty goodness.  But, as I've mentioned before, many things in my life have had to get quicker and easier as the chaos has increased with the addition of 2 young children who hate sleep.  And now I have a job, too.  I am much more enthusiastic about "chuck it in the pot and press start" recipes than I ever was before.  So that's what I really wanted to create here.  I used some proportions from my other recipe, but relied on the Instant Pot to do the work for me.  I took another 3 tomatoes or so and sliced them really thick, drizzled on olive oil, sprinkled with kosher salt and Penzey's frozen pizza seasoning, and roasted them to put on grilled cheese and peppered bacon sandwiches.  So it was like a sophisticated, grown up (but still easy) version of tomato soup and grilled cheese, which is still one of my most favorite meals, hands down. 

Much to my amazement, my almost-5 year old tried the homemade soup.  "Mommy, I do like it," she said.  "Wonderful, honey!  I'm so glad you tried it!" I answered.  "Can I have my regular tomato soup now?  The stuff in the can?" she asked.  So, yeah.  One bite.  I got her to take one bite of the good stuff.  Sigh.

Easy Pressure Cooker Tomato Soup

I used my 8 quart cooker and made a lot because I had tomatoes coming out of my ears.  I see no reason why you couldn't use a 6 quart cooker and cut the recipe in half.  As written, I fed 4 adults and had a decent amount of leftovers.

4 lbs. tomatoes, cored and quartered
1 large onion, rough chopped
1 Tbs. minced garlic
1 cup vegetable broth
1 tsp. kosher salt
1 bay leaf
1 Tbs. tomato paste
2 Tbs. brown sugar
1/2 cup heavy cream
1 to 2 Tbs. fresh chopped basil
salt and pepper to taste

Put the tomatoes, onion, garlic, veggie broth, salt, bay leaf, tomato paste, and brown sugar in the pressure cooker.  Cook on manual, high pressure, for 15 minutes and then do a quick pressure release.  Blend the soup with an immersion blender until it's pretty smooth.  You could also stop at this point, chill the mixture and blend it in a blender once it's cooled.  Then heat it back up on the stove top to finish it.  Or, if you're doing the immersion blender method, blend until smooth and see how you feel about the consistency.  You may want to turn your pot to saute and cook off a little bit of the water if it looks too watery.  This will depend on your tastes and your tomatoes.  I let mine simmer another 5 minutes or so to thicken up a bit.  Turn off the heat and stir in the cream, and chopped basil.  Season with salt and pepper to taste and serve.

 

Winter Is Coming. No, really. It is.

When I say winter is coming, it's not a Game of Thrones reference.  I've never even seen that show because I suspect it has way too much gratuitous blood and boobs to interest me.  No, I mean winter really is just around the corner.  Are you prepared?  Are you stocked up on freeze-proof washer fluid and pet safe sidewalk salt?  Do you have Pinterest-worthy crafts on hand for the inevitable cabin fever that will overcome the kids when school gets called off for half an inch of snow for 3 days in a row?  Have you pulled all the tank tops and maxi dresses out of your closet, to be replaced by sweaters and wellies for sloshing around in half melted snow?  Ugh.  What a wretched, soul-sucking season.  Thank goodness for warm bowls of homemade soup.

But perhaps you never learned to make homemade soup.  Perhaps it all just seemed like too much work, what with the long simmering and occasional stirring and all.  Well, have I got great news for you!  Turns out your pressure cooker makes throwing together a pot of hearty, steaming hot broccoli cheese soup so easy, it's even less work than driving your ass to Panera to go through the drive-thru.  Especially those of you who, like me, have young children that you'd have to bring with you if you left the house in search of soup.  I mean, think about it.  Do you want to remind everyone to go potty and/or change diapers, ask them 800 times to please, for the love of all that is holy, just pick a flippin' pair of socks and shoes already and put them on, get screamed at when you turn off Bubble Guppies before the episode is over, and then finally wrestle everyone into their carseats?  Or do you want to cut up an onion and a few crowns of broccoli and then run your pressure cooker for 8 minutes?  Because that would literally be the choice I would be facing.

When I first started imagining how this soup would come together, it seemed pretty straightforward in my head.  I read a few recipes online to get some ideas and do you know one version called for 2 cups of half and half and 1 measly cup of broccoli?  No kidding.  I submit to that person that their recipe ought to be called cream of half and half soup with broccoli garnish.  But I digress.   I imagined my version to be thickened with a flour and butter roux.  But then I remembered all of the warnings I've read about how you never EVER thicken anything you make in the pressure cooker until after it's been cooked.  I'm not sure what happens if you thicken first, but, given the dire warnings I've seen, it apparently involves some sort of opening of the gates of hell from which chaos and evil rain down upon your children and your children's children.  Or maybe the pot never comes to pressure; I don't know.  At any rate, the advice was duly noted, and that's why I went for a non-traditional cornstarch thickener at the end.  I briefly considered still making a roux in a separate skillet like I do for my potato soup, but this was super easy and gave the desired endpoint with very little fuss.  "Very little fuss" is the key phrase for this recipe in general.  Just the way Instant Potheads like it.      

There now.  We're all one step closer to being ready for winter.

Pressure Cooker Broccoli Cheese Soup

I used my 6 qt Instant Pot and this made a nice quantity for 4 people.  I used fresh broccoli, but I'm guessing frozen would work out fine with possibly a small sacrifice in flavor.  I also used homemade stock because I had homemade veggie stock in the freezer that I had made in the Instant Pot previously, but you can certainly use canned broth.  Thanks to my friend Sue, I've recently become a fan of Better than Bouillon instead of canned broth.  That would be a good choice, too.  Chicken broth is fine if you don't need your soup to be vegetarian.  For the milk, I used evaporated because I like that it doesn't break when you stir it into the hot soup.  You can use 2% or whole milk instead if you want, but you always run a little risk of it looking curdled.

2 Tbs. butter
1 small onion, diced
1/2 tsp. salt
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 1/2 to 2 lbs. broccoli, cut into large florets and stems cut into 1/2" slices
2 cups vegetable or chicken stock
2 cups water
8 oz. mild cheddar cheese, grated  (I prefer to buy a block and grate it myself for better melting)
8 oz. cream cheese, cubed  (that's 1 whole block)
1/2 cup evaporated milk
2 tsp. cornstarch

Turn the pot to saute and add the butter.  When the butter is melted, add the onion and the 1/2 tsp. salt and cook until softened, about 5 minutes.  Add the garlic and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute.  Add the broccoli, stock, and water.  Put the lid on the pot and cook on manual for 8 minutes.  Do a quick pressure release and then turn the pot back to saute.  Stir in the cheeses a little at a time. Keep stirring until they are completely melted.  Whisk together the cornstarch and milk until smooth.  Slowly stir in the milk mixture and continue stirring until the soup thickens.  Season with salt and pepper to taste and serve.