Winter Weather and Winter Soup

We were supposed to spend Halloween weekend with friends up in Westchester going to haunted houses and a maze of carved, blazing pumpkins, but winter struck the east coast and all our events were cancelled by an unexpected October snow.  So, we stayed in the city and the four of us still hung out and had a fun time watching crazy costumed New Yorkers wearing too little clothes, running around a snowy city.

The next day the sun was out, almost as if the previous day had never happened, and so we set out on our weekend bike ride/grocery shopping trip to Fairway.  We started with the Central Park loop and then headed farther north to buy mushrooms and barley for a soup that we had been thinking would be the perfect answer to early winter weather.

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Mushroom Barley Soup

(Serves 8)

2 lbs mushroom (mixture of shitake and crimini)

2 small onions

1.5 carrots

1/2 tsp sage

1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper

1/4 tsp salt

4 cups mushroom broth

6 cups veggie broth

1 1/2 cups barley

4 tbsp butter

2 tbsp olive oil

3/4 cup white wine

3/4 cup sherry

1 bay leaf

 

Put 2 tbsp olive oil and 2 tbsp butter in a heavy bottomed sauce pan.  Chop and then add the onions, carrots, and mushrooms. Add in the salt and pepper.

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Soften and add the barley and 1/2 cup white wine.  Mix 2 cups of mushroom broth, 1/2 cup of sherry and 2 tbsp butter into the barley mix.  Simmer and cover for about 20 minutes or until broth is mostly absorbed.

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In a separate pot heat 8 cups of broth (2 cups mushroom, 6 veggie).  Add the barley and vegetable mixture to this simmering broth.  Add a 1/4 tsp of sage and a bay leaf and simmer for another 30 minutes.

Serve piping hot.

We also made pulled chicken and added it to you-know-who’s soup (below).

Pulled Chicken

1 lb breast

1 cup water

1/2 cup wine

2 cups veggie broth

A few dashes of Penzey’s Poultry Seasoning

We washed the chicken, combined all the ingredients, cooked it over medium heat covered for an hour.  When we took it out it was super easy to shred with two forks.

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We reconstituted this soup a number of times over the week.  Each time we added about 1/2 cup to 1 cup of liquid (combo of broth and sherry and white wine) and usually a pinch of sage.  We had some extra fresh parmesan which we added to change-up our leftovers and it was delicious, but admittedly unnecessary.

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It is now a week later.  The winter weather is temporarily away and we just had our last bowl of soup.  Our comfort-food-soup-craving has historically been Campbell’s Tomato Rice soup (not-so-classy, but oh-so-good) and while we think that the Campbell’s will always serve us well, the soups we have made over the last few weeks are threatening, at least, its exclusivity in our hearts.