Of the basic cooking skills I lack, making soup is one of them. Really the only soup I can make adequately is chili. So let’s change that. What’s your to-die-for soup recipe? Anything from tomato, to split pea, to chicken noodle, to chowders and stews. Let’s compile our best soup recipes.
I make the Pioneer Woman’s sherried tomato soup frequently and it’s always a crowd pleaser. Plus it’s stupid easy. Here’s a link.
I usually make up my own soups as i go. i start with a broth (beef, chicken, or veg) add a meat (I use sausage a lot because of the extra flavor) add veggies and then pick a starch (noodle, rice, potato) time when you add things not to overcook any one ingradient.
So if I was to make chicken noodle i would start with chicken broth, add chicken, boil, add carrots, celery, and onion, boil, once everything is cooked add egg noodles then boil until done.
About how long between ingredients? The one time I attempted chicken noddle I ended up with a large pot of mush because of a lack of timing.
For chicken soup I buy a pre-cooked chicken from the store and use some of it with Lipton dry soup mix as a base. I then add penne pasta for additional bulk and while boiling add in 1 egg for each pack of soup used.
Manhattan Clam Chowder
¼ cup bacon pieces (trim off fat or it won’t be spongy in soup)
¼ cup minced onion
(2) 7 oz cans of minced or chopped clams drained (reserve liquor)
2 cups diced pared potatoes
1 cup water
1/3 cup diced celery
1 can (16oz) diced tomatoes
2 tsp. snipped parsley
Pinch of basil (optional)
1 tsp. salt (bacon already has salt so add this as needed)
¼ tsp. thyme
1/8 tsp. pepper
In large saucepan, cook and stir bacon and onion until bacon is crisp and onion is tender. Stir in reserved clam liquor, potatoes, water and celery. Cook uncovered until potatoes are tender, about 10 minutes. Add clams, tomatoes and seasonings. Heat to boiling, stirring occasionally.
If this is going to be frozen for future use then under-cook the potatoes so that the re-heating process does not overcook them.
Chicken Soup
Take
4 lbs of chicken (on the bone, but it doesn’t matter if you use a whole chicken cut up, 4 lbs of thighs, or whatever, but remove the skin)
4 Qts of water,
4 large Carrots, each chopped in 4 chunks
4 Stalks of celery, each chopped in 4 chunks
4 whole cloves of garlic
1 medium onion, quartered
A small palmful of peppercorns (12 if you’re counting)
2 Bay leaves
Put all in large pot, bring to a boil, turn down to a simmer, and skim off the foam.
Simmer 4 hours.
Pour everything through a strainer to separate the broth from the solids. Pull the meat off the bones and return to the broth. Slice the carrots into discs and return to the broth. Mash the onion and garlic and return to the broth. Throw out the celery*, bay leaves, any peppercorns you captured, and of course the chicken bones.
*actually I throw out the carrots too, because I don’t like cooked carrots. If you don’t like super-cooked carrots, discard.
I have a bunch of lamb stock in the freezer. I think it’s unsalted, but it’s been in there for months and months and I don’t remember. I roasted a cut-up leg bone and then boiled it for the stock.
Suggestions?
I do this too. I love love love soup. You can put a wide array of healthy ingredients in it, make it really filling, and all of the vitamins stay in the pot. My mom has recurrent endometrial cancer, so when I visit I like to make her soups with as many kinds of vegetables as possible to get all those good cancer-fighting nutrients. Then I make the soup for myself, just because.
I usually start with a little bit of oil, carrots, a little garlic, and leeks (if not onions, or scallions, etc.). I love me some leeks. Then I’ll add any other vegetables that need to be cooked until soft, like turnips or potatoes, etc. Sometimes both. I’ll just saute them until the leeks (onions, etc.) are soft.
Then I’ll add lentils (I love using yellow or orange lentils), split peas, 16-bean mix, or barley at this stage. If I have stock, I’ll put it in now, or else I’ll add about 6-8 cups of water with 6-8 bouillon cubes of whatever flavor I have on hand. Bring to a boil, then simmer. Add salt, pepper, herbs (I like parsley, marjoram, sometimes thyme, oregano, basil…whatever spirit moves me), and stir. Cook for 2-3 hours.
Maybe 30 minutes before serving: Add green leafy vegetables like kale (my favorite), chard (second favorite), collard greens, spinach, endive, cabbage, etc. (Not all of them, of course! Whatever you feel like.) Add sliced mushrooms. Maybe a can of chickpeas. What’s really good is if you have a jar of Trader Joe’s Fasolia (giant white beans in a kind of tomato sauce) to add. Add a can or two of tomatoes (fire roasted tomatoes are great).
Add maybe some meat if you wish. I like slicing chicken sausage and adding that.
Serve as is, or with a little pasta, or cornbread.
So in this soup you have onions and garlic, beans, cruciferous vegetables, green leafy vegetables, mushrooms, and tomatoes. Lots and lots of nutrients, lots of fiber, lots of flavor, very little fat, and it’s very filling and tastes great. Eat berries for dessert, and laugh in cancer’s face.
You like having a leek in your soup? 
Actually, that sounds pretty good. I could probably use the lamb stock for that. Add the Holy Trinity, some leeks, maybe some andouille, kale (one of my faves, too), and lentils.
If you like chili you can do Tortilla soup. It sort of similar, but a bit less stewish.
Chicken stock.
chopped Onions
Green Chilies,
Garlic
chili powder
corn,
cumin
chopped tomato.
Whatever southwestern spices and stuff you like.
Then you throw in a chicken breast or two and let it cook. After half an hour(or all day if ya crock it), put out the chicken, shred it with two forks, and put it back in.
Then put it in a big bowl, put some Monterrey Jack, tortilla chips, and avocado slices on top.
Here is soup 101:
Start with mirepoix: onions, carrots, and celery in a ratio of 2:1:1 i.e., 2 cups onion to 1 cup carrots and 1 cup celery - or 2 pounds onions, 1 pound carrots, 1 pound celery all evenly diced.
Sauté mirepoix in large stockpot with a bit of olive oil.
Add broth of choice; chicken, beef, lamb, etc.
To this you can add your protein of choice; cooked beef for beef soup, chicken for chicken soup, sausage, etc.
Now you can add any additional vegetables you want; diced potatoes, green beans, fennel, bell peppers, etc. Here is also where you add herbs or a simple sachet (a small bundle of parsley, peppercorns, garlic). And salt and pepper.
Simmer until vegetables are soft.
Lastly, you can add a starch; noodles, barley, cooked beans.
Simmer until ready.
With some soups at the very end you can add a chiffonade of greens; kale or chard which takes the least amount of cooking.
Learn these simple steps and you can make any variety of soups with varying flavors.
As for adding noodles or pasta to soup, I get better results cooking them separately and adding them to the soup when you heat it up. Otherwise you get a big pot o’ mush. Not sure if this applies to rice.
Butternut Squash Soup
Worst part is peeling the damn squash. Cut in chunks. Boil until soft.
Put in food processor and turn it into mush.
Dump it into the same saucepan where you boiled it.
Add garlic, and some spices. I like to use pumpkin pie spice or nutmeg. Rosemary instead would also be good. Maybe dill. Experiment.
Add cream, milk or skim milk if you like it “creamy”–vegetable broth (they have it prepackaged in a carton if you don’t want it creamy or you don’t want the calories).
Cook on a low burner on the stovetop.
Easy peasy.
Say “yum”.
Pssst! You never, ever (as far as I’ve experienced) have to peel or cube butternut squash for soup!! Just halve it, scoop the seeds, and roast the motherfucker!
Roast a chicken, eat most of it. Put the leftover chicken carcass, skin, and any meat in a large pot with water to cover, add a whole chopped onion, four ribs of chopped celery, 4-5 chopped carrots, a diced potato, a clove of sliced garlic, salt, pepper, 2 bayleafs. Simmer the hell out of it for around two- two and a half hours. In the meantime make some homemade, thick, egg noodles. Remove the carcass and pick off whatever meat is left and return to the soup minus the skin. Add the noodles and simmer half an hour until the noodles are tender and the souop is thickened/reduced. Add a couple of drops of yellow food coloring at the end for that bright chickeny yellow fatty gloss.
Do the same with a turkey.
If your soup calls for diced potatoes, used red potatoes instead of russett. Red potatoes are less likely to turn to mush if they are overcooked.
Sounds to me like that would be an excellent starting point for a soup with some chunks of lamb, barley, some root vegetables (I’m thinking carrots, turnips, parsnips), and finished with some fresh herbs (parsley, thyme, oregano?). Seems more winter soup than summer soup, but I like pretty much all soups at all times. Needs a good crusty bread to mop up the yummy stuff in the bottom of the bowl.
Stuffed pepper soup:
Brown a pound of ground beef. Add 2 to 3 chopped green bell peppers, a can of tomatoes, and any spices (garlic, oregano, salt, pepper, etc.) you would put in stuffed peppers. Maybe a broth cube? Simmer 30 minutes or so while you cook rice separately. Put a spoonful of rice and a ladle of soup in the bowl. Top with parmesan. Thank me.
This freezes and microwaves very well as long as the rice is cooked separately. As soon as the rice goes in, the clock is ticking, so to speak, before it soaks up all your yummy broth. Still edible and yummy, but no longer a soup.
Seems I only make soup in Winter. So I have a few months before I’ll use the lamb stock. (There’s also turkey stock in another gallon-sized bag.) I’ve been pretty successful making chicken-based soups, usually with leek or kale, and sometimes with cream. I expect I can make similar with the turkey stock. But I haven’t made a red meat-based soup.