Sunday, October 31, 2010

Everything You Ever Wanted To Learn About Making Soup

By Christine Szalay-Kudra

Homemade soup is delicious, yet some people are intimidated when it comes to making their own. It may take a little practice to master, but the art of making it can be rewarding. Learn some basic tips and yours will turn out great. These tips can help you overcome any obstacles to making wining creations at home.

The very best ones are made with homemade stock. Any ingredients you use should be as fresh as possible. While this does add to the total cooking time, you cannot beat the flavor. If time is short, you can use canned broth or soups like tomato or creamed verities that come in cans to make your base. Frozen vegetables can also be used if needed.

To lower the amount of fat that you eat, you have two methods to choose from. You can use paper towels without any printing on them to soak up fat from the top, or you can chill your creation overnight. This lets the fat solidify on the top. All you need to do is skim it off and reheat the mixture. Savory verities always taste better the next day anyway.

When you taste your soup, you may feel it is too salty. This happens from time to time to everyone. Add a peeled potato to your soup. After fifteen minutes, remove it. The potato will soak up any excess salt. It tastes pretty good later, too, as it has soaked up some of the flavor of the mixture. When adding herbs, remember that herbs added towards the end of cooking will have a stronger impact than herbs added early. If you are using wine to add flavor, do not use as much salt. Wine will intensify the flavor of the salt.

Everyone loves noodle soups. For the best results, cook your pasta separately. This keeps the pasta from adding starch to your soup. Pasta will be the last ingredient you add. Other ingredients to add near the end of your cooking time include fast cooking vegetables like corn, leafy vegetables, and frozen peas.

Make your soup from ingredients you have on hand. If you have a chicken and some veggies, you have the makings for a delicious soup. Add in other ingredients like rice, potatoes, lentils and more. If you have pumpkins in your garden, make a delicious creamy pumpkin soup. You can make this one either savory or sweet... both versions taste great.

If you like creamed soups but need to watch your calories, you can substitute your heavy cream with a combination of a quart of cold water, two cups of powdered milk and a half can of evaporated milk. Do not boil creamed soups. They are much easier to make if you have a double boiler.

Leftovers can be refrigerated, frozen in jars, freezer bags or in plastic containers. You can preserve it in serving size quantities so it is easy to heat up one or two servings as needed for a quick lunch. Now that you know some soup making basics, it will be much easier to prepare some soup the next time you feel the urge.

About the Author:
Many recipes for creamy pumpkin soups are extremely simple to make. You can easily use fresh roasted pumpkin or canned pumpkin puree - both are excellent choices for this soup. Try making some tonight. You will see how easy it really is.

That's how you make soup!

Chef Brian's Cooking Tips

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