Jenmenke

Road Warrior

Food

Meatless Monday Eleven!

Make that Meatless THURSDAY, instead.

Yes, it’s been a harrowing week. I’m sick (again) and life is spinning out of control. It doesn’t help that I’m not taking it seriously.

Seriously.

Because all I really want to do is get up from my computer and go read a book.

Or go work outside.

Or go for a walk.

Or eat.

And eat.

It doesn’t bode well for clients, the blog or for soccer. I know. That soccer thing came out of left field, but the truth is — though I try to hide from it — I run the the soccer program in our small town. It is a mind numbing amount of work. I try not to complain, but complain constantly to anyone who will listen. And I seriously try not to talk about it, but the reality is, it’s my one valid excuse for everything. So, I tend to talk about it incessantly, too. Who can resist making excuses?

Not me.

Anyway, soccer is in full-out spastic mode and I do little else but fire out emails, talk to coaches, update the website and answer questions. All the live long day.

Enough of that. I’m just making excuses.

Here are the rest of them:

Monday was bookclub. Tuesday Dave was out of town, and you know how I feel about him missing our delightful Meatless Monday! Wednesday was St. Patrick’s Day and we had our traditional Corned Beef and Cabbage meal. So Meatless Thursday it had to be!

And I made it up!

I did get one idea from a cookbook I bought at Miraval Spa from a vacation long, long ago…

Before the austerity program…

Anyway, it was delicious. I’ll get right to it.

Butternut Squash Barley Risotto with Morels and Asparagus

The idea I got from the cookbook was to toast some of the barley before cooking it. To be honest, I don’t know if it made any difference. Perhaps it enhanced the flavor, but I really couldn’t tell you.

The other thing I should mention is that I do love risotto, but I often find it to be too rich. In fact, when I make it at home, I never use homemade chicken stock because I find it to be too strong. I like to use canned or boxed broth, mixed half and half with water. But since I couldn’t use chicken stock on meatless monday(!), and since I recently decided I am not a big fan of my veggie bouillon cubes, I came up with a different flavoring idea.

I sautéed the onions to just the carmelization stage

Added three cloves of garlic. (This, by the way, is still my garden garlic harvest last August. Still looks and tastes pretty good even though it is just starting to sprout)

Then added water, deglazing the pan.

I added a bit of salt, dried thyme, and then some dried morels to the liquid and used that to cook the risotto.

It worked great! Lightly flavored, but not overpowering. Well, truth be told, once you add all that butternut squash, who’s to know what the stupid broth tasted like?!

Toward the end I added pre-cooked butternut squash which I had in the freezer from another meal.

And finally, I added steamed asparagus that had been shocked in ice water at the last minute.

I was stunned to find no shredded parmesan cheese in my fridge, so I used Dubliner White Cheddar instead, which tasted delicious…

I forgot to add the pine nuts I was thinking about. They would have been good. I’ll add them to my leftovers, which I plan to have for lunch today.

The verdict? Sweet, but really good. There is no avoiding the sweet when using butternut squash. I would definitely make it again.

Butternut Squash Barley Risotto with Morels and Asparagus
  • 1 cup pearled barley
  • 4+ cups water (just use a bit more hot water if you run out of broth and need more liquid to finish cooking the barley
  • olive oil
  • 1 medium onion diced
  • 3 cloves garlic crushed
  • 10 dried morel (or other variety) mushrooms
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1 tsp dried thyme
  • 1/2 cup dry white wine
  • 2 cups cooked butternut squash
  • 1 small bundle asparagus spears, cut into 2″ long pieces
  • 1 bay leaf
  • shredded parmesan (or other) cheese for garnish
  • salt and pepper to taste

Heat a large saute pan on low, film with olive oil, add onions and slowly saute, stirring often, until lightly and uniformly browned, about 15 minutes. Add three cloves of crushed garlic and stir 30 seconds or so, until fragrant. Don’t let garlic burn. Add 4 cups of water, and stir, scraping bottom of pan to get all the caramelization into the liquid. Add dried mushrooms, 1 tsp salt and thyme. Keep over very low heat.

Add 3/4 cup of barley to heavy bottomed dutch-oven type pan. Heat on medium to medium high and stir often until barley is slightly toasted, about 5 minutes. Add remaining 1/4 cup of barley and about 1 tablespoon of olive oil, stirring to coat. Add 1/2 cup of white wine (if using) and stir until liquid is mostly absorbed.

Begin adding heated broth mixture 1/2 cup at a time, stirring often. Adding more as liquid is absorbed and gets thicker. Don’t worry about the mushrooms and onions, just add them along with the broth. Stir and add liquid, stir and add liquid. When you have only about 1 cup of broth left, add the butternut squash to the mixture in heaping spoonfuls, continuing to stir. Add the rest of the broth, taste and adjust seasoning. The whole process will take about 30 minutes.

During the cooking time, steam or boil the asparagus and shock in cold water. You want the asparagus to retain a slight crunch and be bright green. Stir the asparagus into the finished risotto until warmed thru. Serve with a drizzle of olive oil, topped with grated cheese and crusty bread on the side.

My Favorite Ragout

Actually it is my only ragout.

I don’t even really know what a ragout is. In fact, up until opening the cookbook just now for the general recipe, I was thinking it was called Ragu! Wait. Is that the same thing? Just a different spelling?

Wikipedia to the rescue:

The term ragout (French ragoût) refers to a main-dish stew. (The etymologically related Italian ragù is a sauce such as Bolognese used typically to dress pasta.)

Your (and my) lesson for the day.

So they are basically the same. Good. I was right. I love being right.

Anyway, this recipe is from a cookbook I’ve had for years: Jacques Pépin’s Kitchen: Cooking with Claudine. It’s taken from their PBS cooking series, which I used to see every now and then. I got it as a thank you gift for donating to public television. I love his recipes. But like most cookbooks I own, I don’t use it much. This one recipe being the exception. I don’t follow it to the letter, because it calls for lardons. No wait: salt pork. It calls for salt pork, which of course I absolutely never have, even if I did know what it was. Salt pork, I suspect, is one of those ingredients that, if bought locally in a standard grocery store in Minnesota, would pretty much stink when compared to the salt pork that Jacques uses. So, with my rationalization, substitutions are a must. Plus, it skims about 30 minutes off the recipe.

What, you don’t believe me? This is the intro to the recipe in the book:

Salt pork is sometimes called cured pork or sweet ‘pickle’ in this country. In France, this type of meat is called lard — hence the name lardons for the small pieces of it we add to stews and other dishes. (What we call lard in the US is called saindoux in France.) French lard is similar to what the Italians call pancetta, and both of these versions of unsmoked bacon are usually leaner than the salt pork we find in markets here.

Look for a salt pork slab with as much meat on it as possible, then cut it into 1/2″ pieces, blanch the lardons to remove most of the salt, and sauté them to enhance their flavor.

Told you.

My method is much faster: I simply use bacon fat to brown the chicken for the bacon flavor and sprinkle crumbled bacon pieces (that I keep in the freezer for quick use) over the dish in the last few minutes of cooking.

I’m not saying it’s better, mind you. But at least it doesn’t require a trip to the grocery store…

Sometimes I’ll throw spinach or kale into the mix, sometime sweet potatoes. If I don’t have white wine, I’ll use red. Scallions get replaced with regular onions or frozen chives if I find mine in the crisper to be slimy and gross…

The point is, just make it work. Don’t get all freaked out because you don’t have what the recipe calls for.

Chicken Ragout ‘Jennie’ (originally titled ‘Jeannette’)
  • 1 T bacon fat
  • 4-6 chicken thighs, skin removed. Either boneless or bone-in
  • 1 bunch scallions (about 6) cut into 1/2″ dice
  • 1 medium onion chopped
  • 2 t flour
  • 1-1/4 c water
  • 1/2 c dry white (or red) wine
  • 2 cloves garlic, pressed
  • 1 t dried thyme leaves
  • 2 bay leaves
  • 1/2 t salt
  • 1 lb small potatoes, left unpeeled but cleaned
  • 1/4 t Cholula or other hot sauce
  • 2 T bacon crumbles
  • optional chopped parsley for garnish (which I also never have)

Heat the bacon fat in a large sauce pan or sauté pan. When it’s hot, add the thighs and sauté them over medium heat for 6-8 minutes, turning once. When chicken is well browned transfer to a plate, reserving the contents of the pan.

To the pan, add the scallions and onion, mix well and cook for 5 minutes over medium heat, stirring occasionally.* Add the flour, mix well and continue browning the mixture for about a minute.

Add 1 1/4 cups water and the wine, stirring well and scraping all the cooked-on brown bits off the bottom of the pan. Stir in the garlic, thyme, bay leaves and salt. Bring to a boil, stirring occasionally. Add the potatoes and browned chicken thighs, nestling everything into the liquid. Return to a boil, then simmer covered over low heat for 30 minutes.

Remove the bay leaves, add the hot sauce and bacon crumbles. Sprinkle with parsley and serve with good bread.

*This addition to the pan will spatter considerably. I say, who cares? The kitchen is a mess after cooking dinner anyway. Dave says, “Use the splatter screen!”

“…But I don’t have a splatter screen.”

“What happened to mine from College?”

“Who cares!”

Guess what I got in my stocking for Christmas this year?

I hate it.

Meatless Monday Ten!

All from The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook!

!
!!
(exclamations are overused, don’t you think?)

Disclaimer: This Meatless Monday features fish, because, by golly, to me, fish is meatless. (Sorry vegans!) Plus, we’ve got a lot of fish to eat in the freezer. Plus, plus, Morgan was gone and she moans and groans about fish, so I took advantage of her absence.

So anyway, here is what I made:

  • Kabayaki Fish with Halibut and Salmon
  • Asian Brussels Sprouts
  • Summer Rolls with Shrimp (instead of lemon grass pork)
  • Steamed Artichoke (because it was getting gross in the fridge) (not from Steamy Kitchen)

It was all delicious.

…No one was sure if we would like the fish and everyone was wishing for the Halibut from New Year’s in the coconut basil sauce, but I said, “No! We must forge new paths, expand our palates! Be adventurous!”

And what I say goes.

My Mom and Dad were here again, depositing their little Pippi before heading off on their next adventure tomorrow (skiing in Big Sky), and as usual, my Dad began to unload all the perishable contents that he had cleaned out of their refrigerator into mine. Among the bounty was a half a bag of brocco-slaw or whatever it’s called — coleslaw made from broccoli stems. He kept trying to get me to use it. In the brussels sprouts. In the summer rolls. He can be very persistent.

And while they would have been just fine in either, I refused.

I like to help him feel young by acting like I did when I was 15: Belligerent. Angry. Selfish. Impatient. It keeps him on his toes.

I like to think of it as a kindness…

In hindsight, I’m kicking myself for not using them to make the broccoli stem pickles from the cookbook. I made those a couple months ago and they were the best. And it would have made my Dad so happy.

Regrets. Regrets.

They’ll get you no where.

I’m going to make them tonight instead, to serve with — what else? — halibut with coconut and basil sauce. [Because I took too darn much fish out to thaw yesterday and we didn’t cook it all.]

Anyway, I’m not sure of the protocol for sharing recipes from cookbooks online. Is that cool? Or is it a copyright infringement? I didn’t really mod these at all, except for omitting the pork in the summer rolls and using shrimp instead. So I’m going to check with Jaden, the author, to make sure that it is OK.

In the meantime, I must say, The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook is amazing. I have made about 7 things out of it so far and each one has been really, really good. I recommend it whole-heartedly. It has quickly become one of my favorites. Very time-realistic, uses short cuts where short cuts make sense and delicious outcomes every time. Can’t wait to make more from it.

Tonight’s biggest epiphany was the summer rolls. I have made these for years. However it has been years since I made them.

Does that make sense?

In other words, I probably made my first summer roll ten years ago. And I probably made my last one about three years ago. Why? Not because we don’t love them. (We do)

But because they are a pain in the ass! Those futzy rice paper wrappers, tearing all the time. It’s enough to make you cry! But I noticed in the cookbook, Jaden has a method of folding them in half before rolling. It worked like magic! Why didn’t I ever think of that? Plus, she really emphasized the need to use warm — not hot — water. And to only briefly dip: 2 seconds on each side. You begin with the wrapper still slightly stiff. It all sounded crazy. I was pretty skeptical.

But it worked.

Like magic!

I already said that!

!
!!!
They were so stretchy and strong, I couldn’t believe they were rice paper wrappers.

My Mom and Dad ate them all. I didn’t even get one.

I’m kidding. I got one.

One measly roll.

My revenge is to post this picture of my dad with his mouth full. Isn’t he a cutie?

[PS. I heard back from Jaden on Twitter and she said “Yes! Please share!” So I will update tonight or tomorrow with recipes. Here they are:]

Fresh Vietnamese Summer Rolls (for 4)

Her recipe calls for a delicious-sounding Lemongrass Pork, but it being Meatless Monday, I used steamed shrimp instead. These are my quantities with a few additions from the original recipe]

  • 8 rice paper wrappers
  • 4 pieces of lettuce
  • 1/2 cucumber, peeled and cut into long match-sticks
  • 1 carrot, peeled and cut into long match-sticks
  • 1 avocado, cut into long strips
  • handful of fresh mint
  • handful of basil and or cilantro
  • 12 peeled and steamed shrimp, cut in half lengthwise

Cut all ingredients and have them ready to use on a plate. Fill a large pie plate with warm, not hot, water. Dip one rice paper wrapper into water, for 2 seconds, flip and dip the other side for 2 seconds. Basically, you are just slowly running the wrapper thru the water on each side. The rice paper will still be slightly stiff. Lay it on a dry cutting board and fold it in half. It will be like creasing paper. Lay your ingredients on top and roll snugly. By this time the wrapper with be soft and stretchy. Serve with peanut dipping sauce. She includes a recipe, but given the chaos in my kitchen at the time, I used LeeAnn Chin brand Peanut Sauce in the bottle from my refrigerator.

Kabayaki Fish (Grilled or Pan Seared)

Her recipe calls for any firm white fleshed fish. I used both Halibut and Salmon. Equally good. And actually, even though our family favorite is halibut, everyone agreed it was a perfect glaze for salmon. It edged out halibut as the favorite.

  • 4 firm fish fillets, about 4-6 oz, rinsed and dried
  • 1 T cooking oil
  • 6 cups steamed short grained rice
  • One handful of toasted seaweed shreds (Nori) SHOOT! I knew I forgot something!!
  • 2 T thinly sliced green onion for garnish
  • For the Kabayaki Sauce:
  • 1/2 c soy sauce
  • 1/2 c mirin (Japanese sweet rice wine)
  • 3 T sugar

In a small saucepan over medium heat, stir together the Kabayaki Sauce ingredients. When sauce begins to bubble, immediately turn heat to low and let simmer for 4-5 minutes, until thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. Be careful, as the sauce can easily thicken too much and you’ll end up with caramel! [Because I have a lot of experience with overly thick sauces like reduced balsamic, caramels and the like, I was overly careful and did not let mine thicken quite enough. It was still delicious, but did not look as beautiful as her picture in the cookbook.]

Set large frying pan over high heat. When the pan is very hot, add the oil and swirl to coat. Lay fillets in the pan, not touching. Fry about 2 minutes, until the bottoms are browned. Brush Kabayaki Sauce on tops and flip over. Brush the bottoms and fry for another minute or two, until the fillets are cooked through and flake easily with a fork.

Serve over rice. Pour remaining Kabayaki Sauce over fillets and rice and top with Nori and green onion slices.

Asian Brussels Sprouts (for 4)

  • Shred or thinly slice about 1 pound of brussels, give or take a few
  • 1 T cooking oil
  • 1/2 red onion thinly sliced
  • 1 fresh minced chilli of your choice [mine were the frozen variety from last year’s garden]
  • 2 cloves of garlic, minced
  • 1 1/2 t fresh lime juice
  • 1 1/2 t fish sauce [don’t let fish sauce averse people see this. They will never notice but it adds a LOT of flavor]
  • 1/2 – 1 t sugar (to taste)
  • Generous pinch of salt

Heat wok over high heat. When hot, add oil and swirl to coat. Then add onion and chilli, and fry for 30 seconds. Add the garlic and fry another 30 seconds, being careful not to burn. Add brussels and stir well to mix.  Then spread the mixture out around the wok in an even layer and let cook for 1 minute. You want them slightly soft at the leafy ends, but retaining a crunch at the stem ends. [I got busy multi-tasking and overcooked a bit and they were still awesome].

Add the lime juice, fish sauce, sugar and salt and stir vigorously to combine. Taste and adjust seasonings if necessary and serve hot.

Those Fried Onion Things


I wasn’t going to post this, but I have the pictures — well, I have pictures of the remnants — and the kids won’t stop talking about them. Begging for more. Stalking my life. Ruining my days.

Why don’t I just make the damn things for them again?

Because I hate deep frying. HATE IT.

It stinks the kitchen up. It stinks me up (and since I only shower once a week, that tends to be a problem). It’s messy. It’s wasteful (of oil). It’s unhealthy.

Now I’m regretting saying that about my shower habits. I was kidding. I shower at least twice a week.

Anyway.

These are the little fritters I concocted to make up for the loss of bacon on our potato soup from a few Meatless Mondays ago. As I said then, I have no idea how satisfying they were, because the kids ate them all before I had a chance to try them in my soup.

And they keep asking me to make them again.

And I don’t want to.

But they really were good.

So maybe you want to make them and invite my kids over?

[It was worth a try.]

I used a batter similar to the one used on the Fuddrucker’s french fries that I made for Morgan’s birthday. Much runnier though. And I was miserly with the oil for frying.

Cuz I’m a miser.

I called them my Homemade Durkee Fried Onions. You know those things that come in a can and go on top of casseroles? It’s not that I have anything against the real thing, but I didn’t have any on hand, and I wasn’t going to make a special trip…

Homemade Durkee Onions

  • 1 onion sliced almost paper thin with mandoline
  • 1/2 c flour
  • 1/2 t salt
  • 1/2 t paprika
  • 1/2 t ground black pepper
  • 1/2-3/4 c water
  • oil for frying

Heat the oil in a small skillet (Well, I use a small skillet because I’m an oil miser and it takes less. If you want to be done faster, use a larger skillet and more oil)

In a shallow pan or plate (I use a pyrex pie pan) stir together dry ingredients. Slowly add just enough water until you have a very runny batter.

Slice the onion very, very thin. I use a mandoline/food slicer for uniformity.

Test a drop of batter in the oil (or use a deep fry thermometer. It should be 350-375 degrees). If the batter instantly bubbles and doesn’t burn, the oil is ready.Using a fork, drag the onions through the batter.

Put a few into the hot oil at a time. They will want to stick together. You can either be obsessive about putting the tiny rings in one at a time, or you can pull them apart once they come out of the oil.

Cook until they are nicely browned, but not black. You want them crispy!

Warning: hide until ready to use. Like strips of bacon, and socks in the dryer, they tend to disappear.

Meatless Monday Nine

Lentil Meatballs with Tomato Cream Sauce

I forgot to take the final picture again. Should I have it for lunch so that I can rectify this recurring nightmare?

(pause for 30 minutes.)

Yes. I really did go heat up, photograph and eat the leftovers for lunch. It was good. And now I have a picture. Win-win.

I continue to agonize about what stuff to make on Meatless Mondays. It seems I am constantly being foiled on one level or another through this whole deal, and yesterday was no disappointment. I returned back from a ski trip with Dave (hence no new posts last week) to find my house destroyed, no food in the house, dishes and laundry up to my eyeballs.

Kidding.

I only said that to upset my Mom, who has begun to read my blog. I like to keep things interesting for her and make sure she is paying attention. Because you see, she and my dad are the the ones who stayed at my house with the kids.

The house was fine. She did the laundry.

All they really did ‘wrong’ was eat the shrimp I was planning to use for Meatless Monday yesterday.

Which was entirely fine, as I had another plan up my sleeve.

A few weeks ago, Jennifer Perillo, a friend on Twitter, posted an intriguing photo and labeled it “lentil ricotta meatballs.” They looked so good and have been on my brain ever since. The timing was perfect, as she posted the recipe last week. Just in time for me!

I won’t retell her delicious recipe story. You can find out all the details by visiting her yourself. She is an amazing cook. Very inventive and creative. Not like me at all. I have very few epiphanies where I entirely create my own thing. Rather, I put my own spin on other people’s things. Necessity being my mother of invention, since I refuse to go to the grocery store to buy necessary ingredients.

Anyway, I digress. Visit Jennie (yes, she spells it the same as me) to find out how to make these delicious meatballs step-by-photographed-step.

Mine were successful, but next time, I would make a few adjustments to my process. My beans were runnier than hers and I needed more bread crumbs. I would, for sure, recommend going the extra mile with the bread crumbs. I used some from a can in my pantry. They were almost a year old. I could taste them. And I would have preferred to taste some of my own delicious bread used as bread crumbs.

I also used pureed cottage cheese in place of her homemade ricotta.

Cuz I was lazy.

That, too, would have made a yummy difference.

I also threw in some additional italian seasonings of oregano, basil, and garlic.

Finally, my sauce. I used frozen tomato sauce made last fall from the garden, which was good. Added some really wrinkly grape tomatoes (which weren’t)…

…garlic, sage, red wine, about 1/4 cup of half and half, and a dash of sugar. The sauce was good. I just wish we’d have had more, because when I put the meatballs into the sauce, they seemed to cannibalize it. I think they absorbed some of it. Which would have been just fine if there had been enough to start with. Still. Were I to do it again, I’d keep them separate until the end.

In hindsight, I would have also changed one other thing.

I would have lied to Charlie that they were made with lentils.

He was totally freaked out. Not that he doesn’t like lentils, because he does. He just couldn’t get his mind wrapped around the fact that the meatballs were made out of lentils. So he picked and picked. Finally ate them and liked them. He kept staring at the innards and saying, “I don’t get how these are lentils.”

Plain and simple: lying would have been the way to go.

Meatless Monday Eight!

Lowly Potato Soup.

I could almost call this Stone Soup. It’s practically the same thing.

Wait, no. That sounds bad. This really is good soup. It’s seems to make a lot of something out of practically nothing. So, in that way it is like stone soup.

It is a very old family recipe.

Actually, like most things I say, I don’t even know if that is true. It seems like a very old family recipe to me, probably because we don’t have one of those families with a rich tradition of cooking — passing recipes from generation to generation — like some. I remember eating this as a kid. And it wasn’t my mom’s recipe. It was my aunt’s. And my aunt couldn’t cook. So how this recipe came to be a success is a complete mystery, unless it was never hers to begin with. Hence the lore that is is an “old family recipe.”

How’s that sound?

Anyway, this was yet another Meatless Monday where we were not together for dinner. I had my monthly bookclub meeting. It was being held at the best cook in the club and I wasn’t going to miss it for anything. Not even if swedish meatballs were on her menu. Oh my gosh. Those swedish meatballs…

…are fodder for another post….as soon as I wrangle the recipe away from her.

I will be eating meatless today (Tuesday) to make up for my Meatball Monday transgressions and will be looking forward to the potato soup. I should mention that Dave was leaving town again Tuesday, so I couldn’t just push Meatless off until today, because — by God, he was not missing another Meatless Monday, I was going to see to that. So I made them the soup before I left for bookclub. Simple as that.

So the soup. What can I say about it? It is very plain. It is very smooth. It is very plain and smooth.

And also, it is very cheap.

And for some reason, every body seems to love it.

Oh, and it is very, very easy. It must be, because, like I said, my aunt was able to make it without burning it.

But there is nothing spectacular about it. It is just creamy potato goodness.

Oh I forgot another thing: it is very healthy, too. Barely a fat-gram to its name. (Assuming you are not one of the non-carbohydrate freaks of nature.)

So here it is:

Aunt Rita’s Potato Soup (for lack of a better name)
  • Russet potatoes, any size
  • cold water to cover
  • 3T flour
  • 3T butter
  • salt & pepper to taste
  • cheese for garnish
  • bacon bits if you are not partaking in Meatless Monday!
  • fried homemade durkee onions if you ARE partaking in Meatless Monday*

* which I will post if anyone is interested. They were so good!

Put unpeeled, whole cleaned potatoes in a large dutch oven or saucepan with a lid. (for 4 people with left overs, I used 4 baker-sized potatoes) Cover potatoes with cold water by about 1/2″ – 1″. Bring to a simmer and partially cover. Cook until potatoes are tender. DO NOT THROW OUT THE BOILING WATER. Drain the potatoes, reserving the water.

Let potatoes slightly cool and peel. Put the potatoes back into the pot and mash. You can put them thru a ricer or food mill first, for perfectly smooth potatoes, or you can use a hand masher. The idea for this soup is to get it mostly smooth.

For the roux, put 3 tablespoons of flour and 3 tablespoons of butter in a small skillet, stirring together as the butter melts. Cook, bubbling, over low to medium low heat about 5 minutes — just until the mixture barely turns a shade darker. (If you are making soup for less than 4 or 5, cut the flour and butter to 2T each.)

Over low to medium heat, add the cooking water back to the mashed potatoes, stirring until smooth, then add the roux stirring well. Simmer 10 minutes or so, adding more water if soup is too thick. Salt and pepper to taste. (it will need salt!)

My cousins insisted that you had to put the shredded cheese into the bottom of the bowl, so of course we do, using cojack or cheddar or whatever else green-sided hunk of cheese we find in the fridge. Then, add the soup and top with garnish of your choice. The garnish being a Menke addition.

Here is the picture Morgan took of her bowl, with the fried onion crisps, which were my attempt to combat the yearning for bacon. They scarfed them up so fast there were hardly enough for the garnish. Lord knows there weren’t any left for me today, so I can’t say one way or the other if the idea worked.

And here was my bowl that I had for lunch today. I added some chopped frozen chives for a little kick:

OK, I lied. I couldn’t take it:

So shoot me. It wasn’t Monday.