Delicious, Creamy Broccoli and Cauliflower Soup - Start with Mirepoix made without oil

Learn to make Mirepoix and Veggie Stock, and cook without oil as you make this recipe!

I still had cauliflower and broccoli left, so I decided to do some kind of soup. The potatoes were ready for digging, and those little red potatoes are delicious alone or in soups. I headed to the garden shovel in hand and heard the dog doing his crazy “I see a critter” howl. Sure enough, there, under the Jerusalem Artichokes was a cute little ground hog! OK, you stay at your end and I’ll go to the other end where the potatoes are!

Digging potatoes is so much fun. Sometimes when I have guests from the city, I take them down to the garden and let them enjoy getting their hands dirty and finding potatoes.

In our garden,  you can turn around and get a juicy sweet snack fresh off the raspberry bushes.

Assembling all of your ingredients before cooking allows for grab and go as you cooking and makes timing things much easier.

Gather and Prep your Ingredients

1. Wash the potatoes, leaving the fiber and nutrient dense skin on

2. Cut the potatoes in ½ – 1 “ pieces (some would like more uniformity)

3. Chop the broccoli and Cauliflower

4. Turmeric adds zing. (and has lots of antioxidants)

5. Potatoes will thicken this creamy soup.

6.  Celery, carrots, onions to start with a Mire Poix

A traditional mirepoix is roughly chopped onions, carrots and celery 2:1:1.

“Mirepoix” is a good base for soups and stews.

Mirepoix is a commonly used combination of onions, carrots and celery – often sautéed as a flavor base for stocks, soups, stews and sauces. (It’s named for the French employer of the mid 1700’s chef who popularized it). I’ll use my frozen home made stock (and we’ll make some more today)

Scraps can be saved and used to make vegetable broth.

Directions:

Chop the mirepoix veggies (save the scraps for future broth) and toss them on the nonstick pan (mine’s ceramic) preheated to high to start them browning. Stir gently often with soft spatula. .

Browning without Oil

Add 3 shakes of pepper. When veggies start to stick or brown too much, use the  frozen stock trick again – put the frozen broth in the pan, and it gives off moisture gradually to let it brown more without sticking. Continue to stir with soft spatula frequently.

Meanwhile, start the  Veggie Stock

Now for those pieces of vegetable ends that would normally go to compost. I tossed them in a four quart pan, fill with water and put on to boil – simmer for 45 minutes to add flavor and nutrients to the water.

Strain or puree and freeze in various size containers.

Add remaining vegetables.

Add the chopped Broccoli & Cauliflower  to the mirepoix and stock, season with several shakes of Turmeric and let them cook.  Toss the potatoes into the pan (things are really starting to smell good); it seemed like powdered garlic was a good idea – so a few shakes of that. Leave on the stove until the potatoes soften (20 minutes)

For a Creamy Soup:

Put ¾ of the cooked veggies in a blender; if they have pretty well soaked up all the broth,  I add a cup of unsweetened almond milk (or soy) – BLEND.

Return to the pan with other veggies– cook everything lightly together and then plan to serve with a pretty garnish. Pictured is basil, parsley would also be good.

If You Prefer a Stew:

Instead of a creamy soup, you can make more of a stew, by only blending 1/2 cup of the veggies, and leaving more large veggie pieces.

Serve with a Delicious Salad – here’s 10 Salad examples for ideas

Veggie stock.

Let the boiled veggies trimmings cool.  Then mash the veggies, and strain the liquid for stock.   Put it in various size containers. I use 2 cup containers for when I make soup, mini containers for when I’m just browning veggies!