Tortilla Soup in Dublin

Two weeks ago, we went to Ireland, again, this time for the wedding of our friends Stephen and Paul. As per my tradition, I cooked up a Mexican dinner for the happy couple and our most gracious host, Mannix. The core piece of this was Tortilla Soup.

Cooking Mexican food in Dublin has always been tricky. From the start, I've had to smuggle in ingredients (Hello, Irish Customs officials who will now actually stop and search my luggage...). Thanks to the wave of immigration from their economic boom, the Celtic Tiger, I've been able to cut back on the contraband.

With a little digging and improvisation, you can now find many of the raw materials in the city. Channing and I made a morning out of scouring the City Centre, hunting things down. If you don't have a time crunch, having a goal like that is a great way to explore an area.

This time, I came over completely empty handed, but was able to find everything I needed for the soup.

Epazote: Well, forget it. Never going to happen. But to be fair, that's the case in the States a lot, too. Fortunately, cilantro is a fine and explicitly approved substitute and somewhat more available. However, in Ireland (and I presume the UK), it’s called “Chinese Coriander.” You can find it in the Asian grocery on Georges St. I know for sure, probably at others.

Corn Tortillas: The folks at Acapulco, also on Georges St., claim that tortillas are too expensive to import as it is, so they won’t sell theirs. However, the fine people at Alamo (by Temple Bar) were much more accommodating. I got at least 4 dozen for 4.5 Euro.

Cumin: Though a staple of Indian cooking, I never saw it on the shelves of Tesco and the other mainstream grocery stores I looked in. But again, it's in the Asian store.

Pureed Tomatoes: Be warned on this one. Tomato Puree here is Tomato Paste in the States, i.e. way too condensed for this and there was nothing equivalent on the shelves to our puree here in the States. I had no interest in making my own from scratch with raw tomatoes. A perfectly good substitute is to take the canned chopped tomatoes you can find at Tesco and puree those. These came packed in tomato juice, which would make the result too runny (since you're supposed to be starting from tomatoes only without added liquid). I poured off about a cup of liquid from the large can and was fine.

One last thing - for some reason, the onions came up very dry in their puree this time. Don't know why this is, because there didn't seem to be any difference. But they usually are more of a slurry texture. I added some water to it, just to make myself more comfortable.

Treebeards' Mushroom Soup

I've been literally been meaning to make this soup for years. I ordered it once at the restaurant when I was feeling a little coldish. Stuffed up, but not enough to stay home from work. I was not expecting the pepper kick and I'll be damned if it didn't completely clear me up. This wasn't a bland cream of mushroom soup, but a blast of flavor and spice with large, delicious chunks of mushrooms.

The only think that held me back was the use of whole milk (or half & half) in the recipe and Channing's hatred of whole mushrooms. Do you see a pattern in what I have to work with here? It's a texture thing, actually.

I knew I needed a soup course for Thanksgiving and I'd made the Eastside's Curried Corn Chowder too many times before (and he doesn't like that, either, because of the whole kernels of corn and the spice). So, I threw this on the menu.

There were enough dishes that anyone who wasn't interested in it wouldn't go hungry (only hurt my feelings), but wanted as many people to enjoy it as possible, of course. I realized that I now have an immersion blender, so I could make it a mix of regular and creamed soup. That way, I could serve the cream-only portion to Channing and still have the basic recipe for us.

Preparation was pretty fast and easy, the hardest part being cleaning 2.5 lbs of mushrooms. I'm pretty fast on these and it still takes about 15 minutes, just for that.

While the result wasn't quite what my 15+ year old memory led me to expect, it was quite good. There was definitely a pepper kick in there which, with the other spices, kept it from being anything like the canned Cream of Mushroom. Most of the heaviness of the liquid was a function of my having blended half of the recipe and using the the half & half itself. I think you could easily go with a lighter milk and it would be fine.

While eating dinner, I did find that there were a few lumps of flour in the mix. They didn't taste too different from the softened mushrooms, so not a big deal, but it was a little embarassing. I need to be more careful with the flour next time. I had made two batches - I'm pretty sure the first was fine, but I was rushing through the second one and I'm willing to bet that I just got careless.

(Turkey) Chili

When I was a kid, every year at Halloween, my mom would make us chili for dinner before we went trick-or-treating. If I remember right, it was to keep us warm on the cold October nights. But it was Texas, for God's sake. Right now, as I type this at 12:30 in the morning, it's 66F down there. It was always an agonizingly slow dinner because I just want to go run out and get the good stuff. It was really good chili, though. I appreciated it a lot more the other times she served it, when I didn't feel I was missing out on prime candy-gathering time.

In the spirit of the holiday, I decided to whip some up. I threw this recipe together from a few I found at the International Chili Society, memory of previous cookups and a few things I found in my spice collection. This works great with turkey, but should be good with beef as well. Tonight's batch was virtually fat free. If you go with beef, I would recommend adding up to another pound, to account for the loss of volume from the fat when browning and draining the meat before adding in the rest of the ingredients. A longer simmer time may be needed to tenderize the beef more.

TURKEY CHILI

2 pounds ground turkey breast
29 oz can tomato sauce
3 cups water
2 tablespoons masa flour
1 medium yellow onion, diced
1 tablespoon dried oregeno
1 tablespoon fresh sweet basil, chopped
1/2 tablespoon dried epazote
1/2 tablespoon dried jalepeno
3 tablespoons chili powder
1 tablespoon ground cumin

Brown ground (turkey) meat until cooked through. Mix masa flour with 2 cups warm water into a smooth paste. Stir into chili to tighten it and add flavor. Add remaining ingredients and simmer for 1 hour. Add water if needed during simmer.

This used up the last of the summer basil crop here. This worked out really well - I'm very pleased with the results.

One thing I've noticed - up here in Chicago, they don't sell ground beef for chili. I know, big surprise, but it never occurred to me how regional that was until I looked for it last year.

I remember my mom mentioned several times that she read one chili cookoff champion claimed his secret was to use several different sizes of meat: regular grind (i.e. hamburger), chili grind (much larger) and stew chunks. His theory was that every judge had a preference for the cut size of meat and, this way, he satisified them all. The turkey kind of naturally ends up giving several sizes of meat chunks, by the way it binds during cooking. You have to really break it up in the browning to get that consistent hamburger texture, but if you dial it back...

Chicken Noodle Soup with Herbs

Quickly on the heels of making the chicken stock, soup had to be made. As I do with most of my soup-oriented needs, I pulled out my copy of the Eastside Cafe's Soup Yourself. I mentioned the Eastside earlier, but it was buried in an update to the running "Things I Want to Make" post.

The Eastside is one of my all time favorite restaurants, owned by a woman I went to high school with, Dorsey Barger. I had the good fortune to go there shortly after it opened, when I was travelling as the Texas sales rep for W.W. Norton (my Willy Loman year - yeah, it was that bad). I went there originally because, even though Dorsey and I didn't know each other that well in high school, it was a touchpoint of something familiar.

Well, it was a double win. I got to know Dorsey better, even in the few spare moments she could spare from running this new endevour, which was great. Neat, neat lady. But even if I had found she was a complete monster, I probably would have continued to eat there anyway, because it's just that good.

There was a certain ubiquitous flavor palate at local restaurants which I labelled simply, "Austin Food." Kind of a California health food/Tex-Mex mix. Lots of black beans, avacodos, tortillas, sprouts, corn, mild salsas, etc. Ultimately, it was bland and a bit heavy. If you're familiar with Austin, I would consider the Kerby Lane to be prototypical in that regard, but it was everywhere you went.

The Eastside's menu was still generally recognizable as Austin Food, but actually had flavor and balance. The Eastside took the ideas that were floating around Austin and executed them right and, from the reviews I've read, continue to do so today.

So, anyway, getting to eat there was an oasis in an unending desert of despair that year.

In deciding what to do with my stock, I realized I'd never gone with the obvious, traditional choice before, so I went with the Chicken Noodle Soup with Herbs. Boy, I'm glad I did. BTW - I emailed Dorsey and she gave me permission to share this (and a few future) recipes.

CHICKEN NOODLE SOUP WITH HERBS

12 cups chicken stock
1 cup onions, diced
1 teaspoon fresh oregano, minced
1/2 cup carrots, diced
1/2 cup celery, diced
1 teaspoon fresh basil, minced
2 tablespoons lemon thyme, minced
1 tablespoon fresh parsley, minced
2 tablespoons garlic, minced
1 tablespoon chives, minced
2 cups dry egg noodles
4 cups cooked chicken, diced
Salt and pepper

In a large soup pot, place stock, onions, oregano, carrots, celery, basil, lemon thyme, parsley, garlic, and chives. Simmer over medium heat for 1 hour. Add chicken and continue cooking for another 30 minutes. Add noodles and cook 10 minutes until tender. Salt and pepper to taste.

*If lemon thyme isn't available, use thyme instead.

Carter, Ruth, Elaine Martin & Dorsey Barger. Soup Yourself: 50 Simple yet Sublime Soup Recipes from the Eastside Cafe'. Austin: Eastside Cafe/Blame Books 1992. p 52. Reprinted with kind permission. Buy it here.

When I make a recipe for the first time, I generally try to avoid making changes, so I get a sense of the baseline outcome. The only changes I made to the recipe were:

• Used shredded, rather than chopped, chicken. Because that's how it came off the roast chicken. Most of the bits were bit-sized, so it seemed overkill to chop them on top of it.
• Used thyme instead of lemon thyme (a noted, valid substitution), since I couldn't find the lemon variety.
• Added more like 3 to 4 cups of noodles instead of 2 because the noodles were pretty big and there was a LOT of empty air in the measuring cup. But more importantly, I really like the noodles and at that point in the recipe, all of the flavors are established. It'd be really hard to screw it up based on noodle volume so late in the game.

Result? Awesome. I kept the salt and pepper to a minimum, which was totally the right move. The flavor of the herbs really came through. This was miles away from any pre-made chicken noodle soups. I was able to get 10 cups of stock from the batch earlier and subbed in 2 cups of stock made from concentrate (not boullion). Next time, I think I'd be safe in adding another carrot, as I like them a lot, but otherwise, it stays as is.

This, also, was the clincher in my decision to expand my summer herb growing operation next year. For the last five years, I've grown sweet basil, rosemary and, occasionally, dill. Now that we have the space outside and I'm using them enough, I'm going to add tarragon, sage, oregeno and thyme. Maybe cilantro, but that's so cheap, it's almost free.

Chicken Stock

Okay, easy, easy easy. I just threw the carcasses from the Chicken 101 class (I had frozen it) and this week's Roast Chicken debacle into a stock pot with a ton of the chopped up carrots from my last knife practice, a chopped up onion, two chopped up celery stalks, some bay leaves and peppercorns. Simmered for 2.5 hours and there you have it. Strained it through a colander and a fine mesh sieve and I've got a mean stock for my Herbed Chicken Noodle Soup this week. Oh, and I got all of the meat off of the carcasses, which will go into the soup. So, no wastage resulted from the Roast incident.

Dal Soup

Things are starting to get a little out of order here, but this was from the Chopping Block class. I think this soup has potential, but as prepared in class, it was pretty bland. At very least, it needs some salt. As soups are wont to do, it did get better after a day or two in the frig.

DAL SOUP

2/3 cup picked-over split skinned mung dal or toovar dal

Wash dal in several changes of water until water runs clear and drain well in a sieve. Cook dal at a bare simmer in 6 cups water in a heavy soup pot until dal is soft and cooked through, 40 minutes. Whisk until the dal is creamy.

2 tablespoons ghee
1 1/2 teaspoons black mustard seeds
2 tablespoons ginger, minced
1 fresh hot red chili such as serrano or Thai, seeded and halved lengthwise
1 cinnamon stick
1 bay leaf
5 cups vegetable stock
2 cups canned tomatoes, seeded and chopped
1 teaspoon ground coriander
2 teaspoons tamarind concentrate
1 teaspoon turmeric
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

In a heavy pot over medium high heat add the ghee. When hot, but not smoking, add mustard seeds, ginger and red chili, stirring, until seeds begin to pop. Add remaining ingredients including dal and whisk to break up the dal. Bring to a boil, and reduce the heat to a simmer, stirring occasionally. Cook uncovered for about 10-15 minutes. Season with salt and garnish with fresh cilantro sprigs.

Tortilla Soup

Tomorrow's a big cooking day - 3 new courses, plus desert and maybe another run at the hollandaise. But in the interest of keeping the content going, I'm sharing this recipe. It's somewhat outside the specific mission of documentation, but it does represent a clear success. I serve this at least once a year at our Holiday party. It can be made vegetarian by using vegetable broth instead of chicken stock. I don't like it as much that way, but it's still totally amazing. My comments are in italics within the body of the recipe.

One year, I accidently grabbed the cayenne pepper instead of the chili powder. Holy Christ. I had to make two more batches with no pepper at all in order to dilute the soup enough that I wouldn't kill anyone. Not only did it turn out well, that's when I realized that this is actually a very easy recipe once you practice it.

Tortilla Soup
I found this recipe in the Houston Chronicle back in 1990 or so.

This tortilla soup was served at the economic summit working dinner for leaders at Bayou Bend last week. The recipe is from chef Dean Fearing's cookbook The Mansion on Turtle Creek Cookbook. I just checked - this book is apparently still in print after 20 years. I have to get this. It is the same soup served at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel, formerly the Remington.

3 tablespoons corn oil 4 corn tortillas, coursely chopped
6 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1 tablespoon chopped fresh epazote (see note) or 1 tablespoon chopped fresh cilantro
1 cup fresh onion puree
2 cups froms tomato puree (Canned is fine)
1 tablespoon cumin powder
2 teaspoons chili powder
2 bay leaves
4 tablespoons canned tomato puree
2 quarts chicken stock
Salt and cayenne pepper to taste
1 cooked chicken breast cut into strips (I make 3 or 4 and shred, rather than slice, them.)
1 avocado, peeled, seeded and cubed (I pass on this. I think it messes with the flavor - yanking it away from the rich corn, chicken and cumin tastes. On the other hand, I serve it with sour cream, which it could be argued has the same result. Your milage may vary.)
1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese
3 corn tortillas, cut into thin strips and crisply fried. (This just has purist pain-in-the-ass written all over it for me. Buy restaurant style chips instead, those locally produced ones if you can.)

Heat oil in large saucepan over medium heat. Saute the chopped tortillas and garlic and epazote over medium heat until tortillas are soft. Add onion and fresh tomatoe puree bring to boil. Add cumin, chili powder, bay leaves, canned tomotato puree and stock. Bring to a boil again, then reduce heat to a simmer. Add salt and cayenne pepper to taste and cook, stirring frequently, 30 minutes. Skim fat from surface if necessary. Strain and pour into warm soup bowls. Garnish each bowl with an equal portion of chicken breast, avacado, shredded cheese and crisp tortilla strips. Serve immediately. Serves 8 to 10. I don't strain it (though I remove the bay leaves). Also, people really enjoy mixing the stuff themselves. I often do the first one and set it by the "mix-ins" as an example. I serve sour cream as one of the options.

Notes: Epazote is a Mexican weedlike herb. Occasionally it is available at Fiesta markets and other Mexican food specialty shops. Soup may be made a day ahead and gently reheated before serving. Needless to say, I almost never find fresh epazote here in Chicago - maybe sometimes at Whole Foods. However, I prefer it, since cilantro as a fairly strong, distinctive taste and smell. What I often do is buy dried epazote (readily available with the Mexican bagged spices, usually in the produce section ), soak it in water for a few hours and double the amount (from 1 -> 2+ tablespoons) to compensate for the loss of flavor in drying.