Cooking with Michy

Usually eaten hot, it’s also surprisingly delicious eaten fridge-cold on a summer’s day with a squeeze of lemon juice and a dollop of natural yoghurt.

 Ingredients

 2 carrots, peeled and sliced

 2 sticks celery, sliced

 2 medium onions, peeled and roughly chopped

 400 g leeks

 2 cloves garlic, thinly sliced

 400 g potatoes, peeled and cut into 1 cm dice.

 2 tbsp. olive oil

 2 tbsp. Chicken base

 7 c. boiling water

 Salt and pepper to taste

 Instructions:

 1. Cut the ends off the leeks, quarter them lengthways. Wash them under running water and cut them into 1 cm slices.

 2. Place a large pan on high heat and add 2 tbsp. of olive oil.

 3. Add all your chopped and sliced ingredients and mix together with a wooden spoon.

 4. Cook for around 10 minutes with the lid askew, until the carrots have softened, but are still holding their shape, and the onion and leeks are lightly golden.

 5. Put the chicken base into a pan and pour in 7 c. boiling water from the kettle. Stir until the base is dissolved, then add to the vegetables.

 6. Add your potatoes. Give the soup a good stir and bring to the boil.

 7. Reduce the heat and simmer for 10 minute with the lid on.

 8. Remove the pan from the heat. Season with salt and pepper.

 9. Serve like this or pulse until smooth using a hand blender.

Source: jamieoliver.com

Review: This was my first test to show off to my parents the cooking skills I have learned so far and it went great. It allowed me to really use my knife skills by cutting up all the different vegetables and ingredients required. I really struggled with getting everything prepare the right way as I have never had to cook that large of a soup all by myself. Even though I struggled a little bit with preparing I showed this soup who is the boss when I cooked it. After now cooking this soup 2 times I didn’t really have any changes to make except for trying to find something else that could add a little bit of a spicier flavour. During the preparing of this soup I learned how to cut multiple vegetable in different ways witch helped me create a unique soup. For this being my first test I found it went extremely well with very few mistakes.

Prep Time: 20 Min Cook Time: 45 Min Ready In: 1 Hr 5 Min

Ingredients

1 tablespoon and 1-1/2 teaspoons butter

 1/2 onion, chopped

 2 large carrots, chopped

 1/2 clove garlic, chopped

 2 cups water

 2 tablespoons chicken bouillon powder

 1/2 pound (3 c.) fresh broccoli florets

 1 cup half-and-half cream

 1 tablespoon and 1-1/2 teaspoons all-purpose flour

 2 tablespoons ice water

 1-1/2 teaspoons soy sauce

 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

 2 tablespoons chopped parsley

Directions

Melt butter in a fryingpan over medium heat; add chopped onions, carrots, and garlic, and cook for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally until softened.

In a medium-sized cooking pot, add 2 cups water and chicken bouillon granules and bring to boil.

Add precooked onion mixture to soup pot.

Add broccoli florets, reserving a few pieces to be added near the end of cooking time.

Reduce heat and simmer, covered, for 15 to 20 minutes or until broccoli is just tender.

In a blender or food processor, puree soup in batches and return to pot.

Reheat soup.

Stir in half and half cream and remaining broccoli florets.

In a cup, mix flour with cold water to form a thin liquid.

Bring soup to boil; add flour mixture slowly, stirring constantly to thicken soup as desired.

Add soy sauce, black pepper, and stir well.

Garnish with chopped parsley (or carrot curls) when serving. Serve soup hot or cold. NutritionalInformation Amount Per Serving Calories: 247 | Total Fat: 16.3g | Cholesterol: 48mg

Source: Allrecipes.com

Review: This cream of broccoli soup really tested our cooking skills. It was really easy cutting up the different vegetables, although we had some troubles chopping up the broccoli we still managed to get all the preparing done on time. Then of course came the hard part, we had lots of troubles trying to get our soup to the right thickness by blending it in a blender. After a few stops and starts we finally got it to where it was just perfect. If I was to make this soup again it would help if there was a suggested time to blend the soup, that way it will save us time from having to stop and start the blender to see if it is the right thickness. I thing I can really take away from this is the fact that I learned how to thicken a soup using the puree process. This will help with many soup down the road. Although we had a few bumps in the road we managed to keep it together and get our soup done in the class time given.

1/4 c. butter

 4 c. thinly sliced onion

 1 lt beef broth

 1/4 tsp. salt

 6 slices French bread, 1 inch thick

 2 tbsp. grated Parmesan cheese

 2 pkgs. (1 oz. size) process Gruyere cheese, grated

1. In hot butter in large kettle, saute onion until golden, about 8 minutes.

 2. Add beef broth and salt; bring to boiling. Reduce heat and simmer, covered, 30 minutes.

 3. Meanwhile, toast bread on both sides in broiler. Sprinkle one side with Parmesan and Gruyere cheese; broil just until cheese is bubbly, about 1 minute.

 4. To serve: Pour soup into individual soup bowls. Float toast, cheese side up, on soup.

Makes 6 servings.

Source: Miller Cafeteria

Review: For this being the first soup I have ever cooked it was awesome. Although we had some ups and downs we still made a great soup in the end. The thing that went really well in in the making of this soup was the advantage of having 4 group members, this really helped in preparing the soup in no time and allow us to finish our soup by the time the bell range. It also really helped in being able to not have to rush because we didn’t have enough group members, but that was not the case. I’m sure you know that not everything can go right every time, one thing that didn’t go well for us was that when we were cutting our onions it’s caused us to cry as if we just saw a sad movie. This caused us to cut some of the onions not the same size as others causing them to not cook as equally at the same time. Now there is always something you can do differently to make the recipe better, what I would do is to try and cut the onions faster so that I don’t start to cry again. This will allow us to cut the onion more of the same size so that they can cook evenly. In the making of this soup I learned that cutting onion is not easy it is hard to deal with your crying while also trying to cut with a very sharp knife. My suggestion is to be prepared for what cutting onions is going to do to you, IT WILL Make YOU CRY!!!!! All in all the soup was great, it was a nice and easy soup for our first one. I really enjoyed making it!

Ingredients:

1/2 pound ground beef

 1 tbsp. oil

 3/4 c. chopped onion

 3/4 c. shredded carrots

 3/4 c. diced celery

 1 tsp. dried basil

 1 tsp. dried parsley flakes

 3 c. chicken broth

 4 c. peeled and diced potatoes

 1/4 c. butter

 1/4 c. all purpose flour

 2 cups grated cheese

 1 1/2 c. milk

 3/4 tsp. salt

 1/4 tsp. pepper

 1/4 c. sour cream

Directions:

 1. Brown the ground beef in a 3 quart saucepan. Drain and set aside.

 2. In the same saucepan, add 1 T. oil and add onion, shredded carrots, parsley flakes, basil and celery. Saute until tender.

 3. Add the broth, potatoes and beef and bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover and simmer 10 - 12 minutes or until potatoes are tender.

 4. In small skillet melt butter and add the flour. Cook and stir for 3-5 minutes or until bubbly. Add to the soup and bring to a boil. Cook and stir for 2 minutes. Reduce heat to low.

 5. Stir in the cheese, milk, salt and pepper. Cook and stir until cheese melts. Remove from heat and blend in sour cream.

Yield: 8 servings

Source: Kim's Krazyness

Review: This hamburger soup it was something else, it tasted amazing with its rich flavour. This soup was probably one of our best soup because of our team work and our determination to get things done. Our team work was what went well with this soup, it really brought us together and showed our greatest strengths. Although you can only go so long be for a down fall, ours was when we cooked the ground beef a little too long causing for there to be a slight burnt taste to the ground beef. The one thing I would change about this recipe is to use and actual chicken broth not a powdered base, as I feel it would bring out more of the rich flavours of the soup. Also I think adding some toasted bread would really bring out the burger taste in the soup and go with the theme of a cheese burger soup. One thing I can take away from this is the fact that I learned how to cook ground beef, even though it got a little burnt it still tasted well. All in all for this to be our last soup it was a good one to end on.

Usually eaten hot, it’s also surprisingly delicious eaten fridge-cold on a summer’s day with a squeeze of lemon juice and a dollop of natural yoghurt.

Ingredients

 2 carrots, peeled and sliced

 2 sticks celery, sliced

 2 medium onions, peeled and roughly chopped

 400 g leeks

 2 cloves garlic, thinly sliced

 400 g potatoes, peeled and cut into 1 cm dice.

 2 tbsp. olive oil

 2 tbsp. Chicken base

 7 c. boiling water

 Salt and pepper to taste

 Instructions:

 1. Cut the ends off the leeks, quarter them lengthways. Wash them under running water and cut them into 1 cm slices.

 2. Place a large pan on high heat and add 2 tbsp. of olive oil.

 3. Add all your chopped and sliced ingredients and mix together with a wooden spoon.

 4. Cook for around 10 minutes with the lid askew, until the carrots have softened, but are still holding their shape, and the onion and leeks are lightly golden.

 5. Put the chicken base into a pan and pour in 7 c. boiling water from the kettle. Stir until the base is dissolved, then add to the vegetables.

 6. Add your potatoes. Give the soup a good stir and bring to the boil.

 7. Reduce the heat and simmer for 10 minute with the lid on.

 8. Remove the pan from the heat. Season with salt and pepper.

 9. Serve like this or pulse until smooth using a hand blender.

Source: jamieoliver.com

Review: This soup tasted so good, although it tested our knife skills it was very smooth soup. This soup although was amazing it had one problem, we diced the potatoes a little too big causing them not to soften up enough, I found them a little to crunchy. Although for that slight mistake I think what helped us accomplish this soup was our team work. We did this by deciding who is doing what and going and doing that task to the best of our ability’s. The one thing I would do to make this recipe it to make sure you know how to dice potatoes so that they are the right softness in all if the cubes so that you can get the best turn out from your soup. In the making of this soup I learned how to control and cut many different shapes and sizes of vegetables. This game me a lot of experience in becoming a better chef with the knife. All in all this soup looked and tasted amazing. Very proud of my group!