Happy Foodie Friday! This recipe review and taste test comes courtesy of Penny and Eleazar Martinez.
Each of our Taste Test Reviews comes with the original recipe and the tester's notes/changes listed with the ingredient list in blue. We hope you enjoy!
What a fun time I had making the White Bean and Mushroom Soup! It was incredibly easy to make and an absolutely delicious starter to a wonderful meal. I made one minor change to the recipe by substituting 3 teaspoons of garlic powder with 4 cloves of garlic. I added the cloves to the cooking sheet still in the shell which we removed prior to adding them in the blender along with the other veggies. Being a longtime lover of mushroom soup, I was shocked to see that this was a completely clean meal. It is gluten and dairy-free and can be made vegetarian or vegan by swapping chicken broth with vegetable broth. It was a very filling soup, so I would recommend having smaller servings. I decided to garnish the soup with fresh parsley, but the soup is so versatile that you could top it with anything like avocado, a dollop of sour cream, or, if you're adventurous, jalapeños. I can't wait to serve this soup at my next gathering!
Additionally, I have no clue where that stick of butter came from in the ingredient picture. Butter is my most used ingredient so I usually just have it always lying around when I cook. I guess it was just natural for me to put it in an ingredient picture. That should show you how shocked I was that there was no butter included and I always thought there had been - that's how good it is!
Makes 6 Servings
Prep time: 15 minutes
Cooking time: 45 minutes
Cost: $15, but I used my own fresh herbs. If I purchased fresh thyme and sage, it would be around $23.
Ingredients:
1 pound mushrooms, halved or quartered
2 large sweet onions, quartered
3 cloves of garlic (I like garlic so I put 4 cloves)
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 1/2 teaspoons salt, divided
1 1/2 teaspoons pepper, divided
8-10 fresh sage leaves
8-10 stems + 1 tablespoon leaves fresh thyme, divided
48 ounces chicken broth (vegetable broth can be substituted for a vegetarian version)
45 ounces canned white beans, not drained (cannellini beans)
Additional salt and pepper for seasoning
Preparation:
Preheat oven to 450F.
Arrange mushrooms, garlic and onion separately in single layer on large baking sheet.
Drizzle with olive oil, and sprinkle with 1 teaspoon salt and 1 teaspoon pepper.
Toss to coat, keeping mushrooms separate from garlic and onions. Add sage leaves and stems of thyme on top of the mushrooms.
Roast at 450F in oven for 10 minutes.
Toss and roast for additional 15 minutes.
While vegetables are roasting, add broth, beans, 1/2 teaspoon salt, 1/2 teaspoon pepper and 1 tablespoon fresh thyme leaves to a large stock pot and simmer over medium heat, about 5 minutes.
When vegetables are done roasting, let cool slightly.
Retrieve 2 cups of the white beans and 1 cup of broth from the stock pot. Add to a blender along with the roasted onions, garlic and herbs.
Cover and blend until smooth.
Notes:
There were about 2 cups of broth and 1 cup of beans left over after taking out some broth and beans to blend with the veggies. The recipe doesn't say what to do with what's left in the pot, so I decided to use this in another meal for dinner tonight!
I learned that some soup recipes have you add the puree back to the extra broth. This wasn't clear in the recipe, so I'm not sure if that's what I was supposed to do. Looking back, I think that's what the recipe wanted me to do.
Recipe and Taste Tester - Cecelia Zook