Jenn Cuisine » Soups

Hearty Spring Soup, Gluten Free

Jenn — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 10:20:25 +0000

Is that really glutenicious bread next to a gluten free soup???? How can that be? I have mentioned this previously, but the reason for my “mostly gluten free” blog rather than “completely gluten free” is that we have a dual household. While my diet is probably 90% gluten free at home, I do enjoy eating some glutenicious foods from time to time – especially given all of the wonderful fresh breads that I now have access to!

However, without care and planning, it is quite difficult for one residence to have gluten-containing foods and still be safe for someone who is intolerant. We have got a system. Basically my muesli and bread and pasta are in a completely separate cupboard from the rest of the food in our home, and I thoroughly clean any surface/utensil/gadget my glutenicious foods were prepared on/with immediately after use. It does not bother me to do these things because I have seen my husband suffer when he accidentally is “glutenized” – trust me it’s not fun for him or me. But developing routine habits of rigid cleanliness has allowed me to enjoy some things that I otherwise would not dare to bring home.

So yes, there is bread next to this soup. I enjoyed bread with my soup, and it was heavenly. I think my husband just helped himself to extra nutella for dessert haha, we go through way too much of that stuff!

So on to this soup. This soup is flexible. Comfort. Unpretentious. Unremarkable. And yet, it is for all those things that I love it. It’s great for those “clean out your cupboards” nights, or when you just want something that doesn’t require a lot of fuss. The pasta and potatoes give it a bit of weight, so it can serve as the main course if you like (as we frequently eat it), or you can simply use it as a first course or side dish. It’s entirely up to you. The quality of taste mainly comes from the stock, which is always best homemade. You can change out the leeks for onions, or shallots, and the Swiss chard for kale or spinach (though I think soup is my favorite way to eat Swiss chard)

(...)
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“Osso Buco” Stew, Sorta OK Not Really

Jenn — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 11:00:23 +0000

Yes, this is osso buco stew, not osso buco. Why? Mainly because sometimes I am lazy. I did not want to have to check it and baste it, especially since it was an amazing miracle that the pot I cooked it in even fit in my countertop oven. Yes, I slow cooked osso buco for nearly 4 hours in a fancy toaster oven. And know what? It worked The veal (queues de veau) was totally fall off the bone fork tender and flavorful. To be lazy, I added more liquid so that the entire thing really stewed. Another part of my lazyness is that I didn’t feel like carrying cans of stewed tomatoes the half mile back with me from the grocery store, so just used some tomatoes I already had in the kitchen instead. I also used leeks instead of onions, and then, I didn’t even serve it over the classic risotto milanese. I just dished it up in a bowl and we devoured it. At this point I probably shouldn’t even be allowed to call it osso buco anymore haha – so I call it osso buco stew.

But then I am one for breaking all the rules and being more concerned about cooking and eating what suits me than getting everything exactly right. I think the world does not need to be quite so worried about doing everything exactly the same. It’s one of the beauties of cooking, because like an art, you cannot help but add your own colors to the canvas that is the food we eat. What would the state of art be if impressionist artists had to see the world exactly as Monet did, or if we all had to listen to music by one composer? Well Monet is a bad example because I love his works and would never tire of seeing them. But you get the idea – creativity and diversity of thought are good things, and no one benefits from cooking everything the same way. That is not to say that people should not learn the proper skills to cook, because understanding how to use the tools you have to work with is important – but a recipe is not a technique, it is an idea, a personal and unique expression. Sometimes I think we should not be so fussy to get every detail just right, and be able to play.

I’m not saying that is an excuse for me being lazy and not wanting to carry cans of stewed tomatoes back with me – but my end creation was something a little different and yet still satisfying. In fact, it was perfect on a cool blustery Winter day that desperately tried to be Spring.(...)
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Cream of Chestnut Soup

Jenn — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 16:00:24 +0000

Ever since I started making food with chestnuts, I have been searching out great chestnut recipes to try. I just cannot get over how much I love their earthy flavor. I happened to come across this great chestnut soup recipe over at The Bitten Word a couple of weeks before Christmas and knew that I had to make this for Christmas dinner. Chestnuts, more than most other holiday foods, seem to really typify the holiday season. After all, everyone knows the song that starts “Chestnuts roasting on an open fire…” This soup is perfect for falling in love with chestnuts all over again.

For this soup I made a couple of changes – one, I kind of cheated a little and added some chestnut puree into my soup, because our last chestnut roasting experience, while delicious, really cut up our hands alot trying to peel all of those shells. And the thought of doing that for 3 lbs of chestnuts was well, intimidating haha. I also used a lot less broth than called for – and then at the end after the soup was pureed in the food processor and added back to the pot, added in a couple cups of heavy cream.

For the garnish, I fried up thinly sliced rings of pancetta and used fresh thyme. Overall the soup was a great hit. It was definitely not something my family would usually add to their holiday menu, but everyone really liked it. I think it’s because chestnuts bring a mellow and yet far reaching flavor, and if you aren’t used to eating chestnuts, they taste like one of those flavors where you go “yes, I have come across this sort of flavor before but I cannot quite place where or when”. There is a comfort that comes with that instant familiarity even though for the life of you can can’t remember eating a chestnut before in your life. At least that was how I felt the first time I ever ate chestnuts, and I think how my family felt at Christmas dinner as well. This soup was the perfect appetizer for a formal meal, but I would be inclined to make this for any occasion, I loved it so much.

Photography Note – yes, I used direct overhead incandescent lighting, so things are a little shiny. But I had no choice, we were serving it right then! I know I know, I really need to take pics during the daylight…..

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Pumpkin Shrimp Bisque

Jenn — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 23:01:42 +0000

I’ve decided that pumpkin is the most versatile food on Earth. You can use it equally in savory or sweet dishes, and it works with a wide variety of flavor profiles, from sweet maple/vanilla to sage/nutmeg to curries or gingery flavors. I think those are the most popular combinations, but I also love trying out new flavor groupings. So when I was looking up shrimp bisque recipes (as I’ve never made a bisque before) and came across this one on Epicurious for pumpkin shrimp bisque, I was instantly sold and knew that this was the one I had to make.

But you know me, am I ever one to make a recipe by the book? Well, rarely. I added in potatoes and corn to give this a bit of a heartier feel, a bit more cream, and added one spice that I just love – a Hungarian smoked paprika – that along with the saffron really gave my soup a great vibrant color. If you didn’t know, paprika is a spice made from peppers (hot or sweet), and can vary quite widely in taste. The paprika that I have has just a slight bit of heat and a really nice Earthy tone that I love to use in a variety of dishes. Given that I typically think of shrimp bisque as having a bit of a cajun feel, I thought the paprika would go really well here. Seriously, this stuff has far more uses than just sprinkling on your deviled eggs. One can also be fairly generous with the amount you use as far as spices go, as it tends to blend nicely rather than stand out or be especially overpowering. I used a good full teaspoon here.

However, one should be a little bit more conservative with the cayenne. My husband was hilarious because as I was making this soup for my family, I had asked him how much heat everyone could handle. He recalled to me how my dad really laid on the cayenne in a meal a few weeks ago, and so I should use a lot to make sure my dad would like it. So I just kept shaking as he was talking until I finally figured out that he had confused cumin for cayenne. Oops! So my soup was a tad bit spicy. Don’t do that. I just wasn’t thinking. If I had thought about it, it’d be obvious not to add so much. Oh well!

Overall? This was a great soup. Hearty and filling, full of flavor, and just overall delicious. Some bread toasted with cheddar cheese on it (just under the broiler quick) is a great accompaniment.

Pumpkin + shrimp, paprika, saffron = great yummy flavor combo!

P.S. Yes, haha, I often write in equation form, it’s a natural consequence of being a scientist

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Adopted from The Herbfarm Cookbook by Jerry Trawnfeld, Epicurious March 2000

Ingredients:
1 lb. medium sized fresh shrimp, peeled and deveined, tails reserved
2 tbs. olive oil
3/4 c. sherry
4 c. seafood stock
pinch saffron
1 tsp. paprika
3 sage leaves
3 bay leaves
2 ribs celery, chopped
1/2 onion, chopped
2 c. corn (frozen)
1/2 lb. new potatoes, peeled and diced
2 c. pumpkin puree
1 c. heavy cream
cayenne, to taste
juice of 1/2 lemon
black pepper, to taste

Directions:
1. Heat olive oil in a pan (medium) and saute the tails until fully cooked and just starting to brown. Add the sherry and let boil until the liquid is gone.
2. Add the rest of the stock ingredients – stock, saffron, paprika, sage, bay leaves, celery, onion – and bring to a boil. Then let boil for a good 30 minutes covered to let the stock develop its flavor. After that strain the broth and return to the pot. Add in the potatoes and corn and bring back to a boil, and cook another 10 minutes or so until the potatoes are soft. It won’t take very long because the potatoes are cut pretty small.
3. While that is boiling, chop shrimp into thirds and saute in a pan with some olive oil until cooked (just a few minutes are needed).
4. With a wooden spoon, stir in the pumpkin, then heavy cream and cayenne and bring it back to just a simmer. Let simmer 10 minutes. Then add shrimp, lemon juice and pepper. Pour into bowls and serve! I tried garnishing with paprika. It looks odd as a soup garnish.

Note – if you sub in the turnips for potatoes and omit the corn, this can be quite diabetic friendly, as that 1/2 lb. will be spread out through a good 4-6 servings.

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Creamy Smoked Cheddar & Broccoli Soup

Jenn — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 03:43:16 +0000

To tell the truth, I really didn’t feel like cooking today. Getting up this morning to a chilly breeze and frost everywhere didn’t help with my motivation either. In fact, all I really wanted to do was just curl up back in bed and stay there, where it was nice and warm under the down comforter. That feeling carried through the entire day too. I was just dragging all day. Do you ever have those days? They are rough for sure.

So dinner was to be simple tonight. Simple, and comforting. Mmmm broccoli and cheese. You can’t get much more comforting than broccoli and cheese together. In fact, the mere idea of enjoying a bowl of cheesy broccoli soup was enough motivation to get me through the day and get everything done that I needed to.

I’m not going to go through a long introduction for this one – cheesy broccoli soup needs no fancy remarks. But this soup, like so many of my favorite comfort foods, touches more than the taste buds. It transports one to a place of calm and happiness, erases all one’s cares and worries, if for only a brief few minutes. Though I must say that a smoked cheddar is awesome in this soup. Definitely splurge for the smoked cheddar rather than plain if you are thinking about making this soup, it makes a world of difference, and then it blends really well with the nutmeg and paprika that I added in. Oh, and this is super filling. Which is a good thing!

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Ingredients:
2 shallots, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 tbs. butter
1/2 tsp. paprika
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
black pepper
1 head broccoli, cut into small florets.
4 c. veggie broth
12 oz. grated smoked cheddar cheese
1 c. heavy cream
2 tbs. cornstarch dissolved in 2 tbs. water

Directions:
1. Heat up a pot and saute shallots and garlic in butter until translucent and fragrant. Add in spices.
2. Add broth and broccoli to pot, and bring to a boil. Then turn down to a simmer and let simmer until broccoli are well-cooked and soft (about 15 min).
3. Slowly add cheese, one handful at a time, and continue stirring. Turn heat down a bit more so that soup remains hot (steaming) but does not come back to a boil (that will risk the cheese getting clumpy). Once all incorporated, while stirring, add in the heavy cream and then the cornstarch.
4. Serve in bowls and granish with blanched broccoli florets if you like. Goes really well with some bread too.

Photography Note – Now that we have “fallen back” an hour, daylight has become a rare commodity. On top of that, living with my family these few months means I have no space to set up a place for pictures – no designated table, no reflectors, no place to put up my own lighting if I purchased any. This is the best I could do using all fluorescent lighting in our kitchen. When I use the incandescent light over the stove (which gives better color than fluorescent) everything comes out so shiny that it really looks no good. So I chose more diffuse fluorescent over more direct incandescent. Was this the right choice to make? Ha or maybe the right choice is to make lunch instead of dinner so it’s still daylight out…

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Butternut Squash, Two Ways

Jenn — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 02:05:41 +0000

Buttery Pan-Fried Butternut Squash

Creamy Butternut & Pumpkin Soup

These two dishes came from the same butternut squash. Actually, the first dish went on to become the second. I LOVED the first dish. Roasted butternut squash, pan fried with cannellini beans in a LOT of butter with sage, tarragon, and nutmeg. The buttery smoothness to the squash was delicious and made the flavor melt in my mouth. However, the flavor was apparently too mild for other members of my family and they wanted more flavor. I still say that this makes a great side dish. If you make this, let me know what you think!

So what did I do to rectify the problem? Well, the next night, I just turned it into a soup! While the idea of adding a meat like ham to add flavor was tempting, I really wanted to keep this vegetarian. So I pureed the squash dish, added some pumpkin puree and broth, and of course copious amounts of heavy cream, and voila, a completely different dish! Mixing these two very distinct and flavorful squashes together in soup blended really well. You don’t need much pumpkin because it’s flavor is very prominent.

This is also my submission to the Holiday Food Fest, Thanksgiving and Fall Dishes hosted by Tasty Eats at Home!

Buttery Pan-Fried Butternut Squash

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Ingredients:
3 lbs. butternut squash
salt
1 stick butter (1/2 lb.), sliced for faster melting
2 c. cannellini beans (1 can, drained)
2 tbs. fresh sage
2 tbs. fresh tarragon
nutmeg
salt/pepper

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350F. Slice squash in half (lengthwise) and scoop out the seeds. Salt and roast in the oven for a good hour (flesh side down) or until tender.
2. Once cool enough that you can handle them without burning yourself, slice into bite size cubes. Combine with beans.
3. Heat up a large skillet (you may need to do this in batches) and add butter and herbs/seasoning. Fry in skillet for a couple minutes until all the butter is absorbed by the veggies.
4. Serve and enjoy!

Creamy Butternut & Pumpkin Soup

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Ingredients:
4 c. buttery pan fried butternut squash
2 c. veggie broth
1 c. pumpkin puree
1 c. heavy cream

Directions:
1. Add pan-fried squash, broth, and pumpkin puree to a medium pot, and heat up until broth begins to simmer.
2. Pulse in a food processor until all is smooth and return to the pot.
3. Heat on medium for about 10-15 minutes, so it simmers for a little bit. Then stir in cream.
4. Serve and enjoy!

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DC#6: Pho Ga – Vietnamese Chicken Noodle Soup

Jenn — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 03:59:58 +0000

The October 2009 Daring Cooks’ challenge was brought to us by Jaden of the blog Steamy Kitchen. The recipes are from her new cookbook, The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook. I was so excited to hear that Jaden was hosting this month’s challenge, I instantly became a fan of hers after making a fantastic super easy three cheese soufflé a couple weeks ago that came out awesome. She presented to us not one, but two awesome challenges for this month. The first was this one – pho ga, or Vietnamese chicken noodle soup. This was my first venture into Vietnamese cuisine, and I instantly realized how sad a thing it is that I have waited this long to make Vietnamese food.

The recipe for pho ga was pretty straightforward, but a few twists were added for the Daring Cooks’ challenge. Most DC challenges offer a lot of room for freedom and creativity, however this recipe was very specific. Even the spices had to be followed to the letter. The one technique that was absolutely required that was not explicitly a part of this recipe though was toasting the spices. I LOVED the spices in this broth. The star anise, cloves, and coriander, once toasted, offered a fragrant warmth and complexity to the broth in a combination my taste buds had not embraced before. Toasting was actually pretty easy – all that is needed is to heat spices on a hot pan for a few minutes until they brown and become fragrant.

I really think that the key to this broth is the slow simmering of the broth with the chicken, toasted spices, and char-broiled ginger and onion. The combination is just heavenly. A little bit of sugar (or diabetic friendly erythritol) and the broth is perfect. I did make a few changes – I used chicken broth rather than water, subbed the hoisin sauce in order to be gluten free, and also used fennel with the veggies for the soup. I thought the fennel would be a great addition given the licorice flavor that would match the star anise well. I also just added the rice noodles directly to the broth rather than cook them separately, that way they could absorb some of the broth flavors – to be diabetic friendly, my mom just did not eat any of the noodles, which was easy enough to do.

Overall, the dish was a great success!

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A New Autumn Tradition: Buttercup Squash Soup

Jenn — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 17:27:06 +0000

As the rain drizzled down the old glass pane windows and pattered upon the sweet cedar smelling rooftop of our A-frame cabin, the gloomy day in the NH forest seemed a bit brightened after being comforted by a warm cup of herbal tea, curled up on a couch with a good book. The only thing that seemed missing from my perfectly rainy day was a nice hot bowl of a good hearty soup, and of course nothing could be more fitting on such a Fall day than some local fresh squash soup. Seriously, does this sky look like it’s going to be forgiving anytime soon?

One great thing about the Autumn here in New Hampshire is the plethora of farm stands on every roadside. During our holiday we bought as much of our produce from local farm stands that we found as we could. I had originally had it in my head that I wanted to use the squashes themselves as the soup bowls, but that turned out not to go with the way the soup evolved. This soup took a bit of time (especially without electricity to use fancy advanced things like, oh say, a hand mixer), but oh was this worth it – roasted buttercup squash, sweet apple ham steak, and white beans were the hallmarks of this delicious soup. I had never had buttercup squash before, but it is really rich and sweet, similar but not quite like a butternut squash. You could puree the squash if you want to to have a smoother soup, but this time I preferred to have it a bit more heterogeneous, with some yummy bites of actual squash as you ate the soup. I have a feeling this will be a great one to repeat again this season and throughout the winter!

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Ingredients:
For the veggie broth:
2 carrots, peeled and chopped
2 celery stalks, chopped
½ onion, chopped
thyme
salt/pepper
4 c. water
For roasting the squash:
4 buttercup squash (or your favorite type of squash), about 9 lbs.
olive oil
salt/pepper
For the rest of the soup:
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 lb. sweet ham steak (I used an apple maple flavored ham), cubed
2 c. (1 can) white cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
¼ c. parsley, minced
thyme, sage

Directions:
1. Prepare the squash: Preheat the oven to 350F. Slice the squash in half, and scoop out the seeds/inside. If you want to roast the seeds (which I always do because fresh toasted seeds are awesome), then save them so you can rinse and dry and roast them.
2. Place the squash halves rind side down on a large pan, drizzle olive oil over and sprinkle with salt/pepper. Roast for a good hour, until the squash is softened.
3. Meanwhile, start the veggie broth. Add carrots, celery, onion, thyme, salt/pepper and water to a pot, and let simmer while the squash roasts.
4. Once squash is done roasting, scoop out the squash meat (I just used a spoon) and add to a large pot. Mash the squash, using a rudimentary potato masher by hand if you don’t have electricity on your vacation, or a hand mixer if you do, haha. Gradually add about 3 cups or so of broth to the squash while mixing.
5. Add ham, beans, and herbs to the soup, and bring to a boil. Simmer for about an hour or so, adding more broth if necessary. It shouldn’t be a very liquidy soup, but not as thick as a chowder.
6. Serve hot, and garnish with parsley.

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Bouillabaisse

Jenn — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 01:54:23 +0000

This post is my submission to September’s “Go Ahead Honey, It’s Gluten Free!” event, hosted this month by Gluten Free Gidget. The theme this month was Disney. The first thing that came to mind was one of my favorite movies as a little kid, “The Little Mermaid”. I immediately thought of the scene where Sebastian the crab is trying to escape the palace chef, and the chef is singing “Les poissons, les poissons, how I love les poissons, love to chop and to serve little fish….” And so in honor of that song, I bring to you one of my favorite French seafood dishes, bouillabaisse!

Bouillabaisse (pronounced “BOO-ya-base”) is a French fish stew from the area of Provence, and highlights bright bold flavors along with fresh seafood. I want to try my hand at making more Provençal style recipes, mainly because I love the region and the food so much. I have not really made very many traditional French recipes on this blog yet, but I hope to bring more to you, my lovely readers, in the future!

This dish is pretty free form, and there is a lot of room for creative license. There are a couple of key features – one, you should use at least three different types of fish. I recommend mild white fish that do not impart a very “fishy” taste, along with at least one shellfish. Two, the dish involves a flavorful broth with lots of saffron and aromatic vegetables – by aromatic I mean like shallots or onion, garlic, fennel, etc. The dish is traditionally served with by dishing up the seafood you want, then adding in strained broth and topping the soup with croutons and rouille (pronounced “roo-EE”), a spicy garlic sauce. I did take a few liberties there in order to keep this gluten free and diabetic friendly (like no croutons, no potatoes).

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Adapted from Gourmet July 2002

Ingredients:
For the Rouille:
2 slices bread (gluten free), crumbled
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 tsp. cayenne pepper, ground
1 cup seafood broth
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
For the Soup:
extra virgin olive oil
1 clove garlic, sliced
1/2 red onion, chopped
1/2 yellow onion, chopped
1/2 bulb fennel (anise), chopped)
2 stalks celery, chopped
1 tsp. saffron
1 tomato, chopped
1 red bell pepper, chopped
sprigs fennel
bay leaf
salt/pepper as needed
2 cups dry white wine
8 cups seafood broth
1 lb. white fish (cod, sole, etc.), cut into bite size pieces
1/2 lb. lobster or crab meat, cooked and cut into bite size pieces
other seafood/shellfish if desired (mussels)

Directions:
1. Start on the rouille first. Combine bread crumbs, garlic, and cayenne in a food processor. Then whisk in broth, and gradually stir in olive oil to create an emulsion. Set aside.
2. Heat up a large pot and add in olive oil. Add in garlic, onion, fennel, celery, and saffron. Let the veggies soften, and then add in tomato, bell pepper, fennel sprigs, and bay leaf, and deglaze a bit with white wine.
3. Add in the seafood broth, and bring to a simmer, and cover. Let simmer for at least 30 min.
4. Add in fish, and let simmer a few minutes until the fish is cooked. It will be flaky and tender. At this point, add in the lobster/crab meat. Let cook another 5 min.
5. Right before serving, add in mussels so that they can steam. Strain broth and reserve.
6. To serve, dish up fish/veggies that each person wants to eat, and add in strained broth. Top with rouille (use sparingly, it’s mighty hot!)

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Labor Day Part Deux, Dessert – Summer Berry Champagne Soup with Floating Islands

Jenn — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 09:00:23 +0000

I don’t think I ever really got to enjoy Labor Day as it was intended. When I was working as a grad student, it was simply a day when I could park in the garage for free, just like 4th of July and the other federal holidays. In fact, federal holidays were some of the best times to get work done, because no one was on campus which made logistics of coming and going a lot easier, especially when running those 24-48 hr long experiments (there is a reason for that futon that was in my office!). Now, the only labor I was doing on Labor Day was in the kitchen, which I sometimes think is not too unlike the chemistry I was doing for grad school, haha. Cooking and chemistry have a lot in common. It amazes me sometimes how often I use my chemistry knowledge in the kitchen.

For example, I wanted to adapt this beautiful summer berry and champagne soup with floating island and caramel sauce (gosh does Ramsay come up with long titles for his dishes!) to be diabetic friendly. It sounds like a challenging feat, I know. Well, it really wasn’t that hard, it just took a bit of thought. I wanted to avoid stevia here, because stevia tends to do weird things with heat. It just isn’t that stable to be able to cook with it.

So instead, I tried a different type of sugar substitute, called erythritol – this is a sugar alcohol, from sugar, that I was able to find organic at my local natural foods store. While it does have carbs, it has 0 glycemic index. My mom wanted to see if she would react to it at all, and her blood sugar was not affected in the slightest! Apparently it has a “cooling effect”, meaning that it changes the temperature of whatever you try to dissolve it in, which can pose a problem trying to use it with more temperature-fussy things like chocolate or hard candies. In science that is called an endothermic process. However, this was only needed for meringue, which I didn’t think was going to be as finicky about any temperature issues. Since the crystals looked closer to sugar than the stevia (I know, highly precise assessment here), I thought I would give it a try. I used 1/2 cup (more than the recipe called for because this is less sweet) when making the meringue. To my surprise, the meringue totally held up, and got that same glossy sheen that you would expect when adding sugar while beating egg whites – success! It totally passed the “hold the bowl upside-down over your head” test…

The next step was to poach the meringue quenelles in vanilla and minted milk. I am not quite sure how/why this works. Everything I have been taught about meringue is that any sort of humidity can mean total and utter collapse of your meringue. And yet I think this is a pretty standard step for floating islands – as I carefully ladled simmering milk over my quenelles, they stayed completely intact! Any chemist out there want to take a stab as to why this is so? Poaching them in this fashion allowed the meringue to absorb the wonderful vanilla flavor from the simmering milk. It was wonderful.

These were served on top of the fruit soup, which is really a glorified smoothie. I used blueberries, blackberries, and raspberries because strawberries and currants were no where to be found at the farmer’s market at this time of year. Actually I have never seen currants sold here. I would love to try some one day. I noticed on the episode of the F-Word that this was featured, guests said the soup was bland. So when I made this, instead of about 2 cups of fruit, I used closer to 3.5 cups. I think this was a good idea, because the soup was definitely not lacking in flavor!

And finally, the caramel sauce – I had no idea how to convert this to be diabetic friendly, so my mom said she was happy to have the soup with the floating island and omit the sauce. Because of this, I was able to make the sauce exactly according to the recipe, though I am still a bit confused as to why Ramsay had you melt the sugar with some water. I slowly let the sugar dissolve, as suggested, and then turned up the heat to give the liquid some color. Instead of browning nicely, what happened was as the solution was bubbling away, all the water boiled away and then all the sugar precipitated out (see, there I go using chemistry terms again while cooking). I was left with dry sugar in my pot. I just don’t understand the point of initially adding the water, what was the purpose of that? No big deal, I just let the sugar melt as if that was what was supposed to happen and went from there. The sauce turned out great.

To serve, I poured in the soup, then added the quenelle (well, it was supposed to be shaped like a quenelle, but lack of the right size spoons made it a bit difficult to make as pretty) of meringue, and topped with caramel sauce for those of us that could have it. My dad decided to also enjoy a cordial of cassis with his, which you can see in the background of the pic.

Overall, my Gordon Ramsay inspired Labor Day menu was a resounding success!! Both dinner and dessert were gluten free, and adaptable to be diabetic friendly, while still being incredibly flavorful and tasty for those of us without dietary restrictions. I hope you all had an exciting and relaxing weekend filled with good food and family/friends as well!

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