Tag: Soup

Bouillabaisse and Burnout

Have you ever been so tired, not just physically tired, but emotionally and mentally exhausted – so depleted of any and all patience you once had and any fucks you once gave, that you consider smashing your alarm/phone when it goes off every morning and never going into work ever again, despite the consequences? Are you so tired at the end of every work day and work week that even social engagements that should be fun seem like one more box to check off on your to-do list? You can’t even enjoy sleeping past 9am on a Saturday morning, because as you lie in bed knowing that even though you could easily sleep another 3 hours, you think about all the errands and cleaning you need to get done that you didn’t have time for on the week days? If this sounds like you…. welcome to the club, friend.

I never realized how exhausting daily life is until maybe around two years ago, when I actually started caring about the things I didn’t when I was 25… things like moisturizing my aging skin, washing off my makeup after being out late, making sure I have essentials like coffee, paper towels and toilet paper stocked before they run out and I wake up to no coffee and no TP, following up with friends, keeping a semi-full fridge so I can make real food instead of living on rice and frozen peas, and keeping mostly spotless floors and counter tops. Shit is exhausting on top of working full time to pay rent and bills! I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I have no idea how my mom worked full time, cooked most nights of the week, and juggled three kids and their respective schedules. I just juggle myself, a boyfriend and one very demanding cat, and it’s all I can do not to collapse on the couch as soon as I am home from work every day.

  • My VERY demanding cat ^^^

I’ve been thinking about the term “burnout” a lot today, after reading a pretty good article about it’s effect on my generation. I’m lucky I have a good full-time job and am not juggling multiple gigs, or even worse, unemployed and dealing with the stress of finding work. I am also lucky that I don’t have to worry about taking care of kids on top of everything else at this point in my life (although kids are a conscious CHOICE), so I shouldn’t complain, but goddamn I need a vacation or a life style change.

I think a change of city, state, or preferably country is in order. I think a simpler life, a life with less stress, could be achieved if I didn’t live in such a hard city to get by in. NYC is brutally exhausting. Time moves so fast and doesn’t stop for anyone or anything. I know that is true of anywhere, especially as one grows older and begins to feel time tick by in a way it doesn’t when you’re still an adolescent. However, I feel like there are places where people force themselves to slow down and appreciate the simple pleasures of life and the beauty of life and people who surround them – dinners with family and friends, grocery shopping and meal preparation on a Sunday afternoon; nature and all of its offerings, a work culture with ACTUAL FUCKING VACATIONS AND HOLIDAYS (Cough**ALL OF EUROPE! **Cough!), a work culture where you and your spouse will have substantial and PAID time off of work following the addition of a new child to the family. This…. THIS is the kind of life I want. I’m tired of living in a country where basic human needs aren’t met unless you score a decent job. Shouldn’t everyone be entitled to healthcare, good education, and paid maternity/paternity leave? I’m also so tired of the fucking rat race that is NYC. Why do I continue to live here? What reward do I get each day for making myself submit to the horrors of the MTA and hourly commute to and from the office? A paycheck that just about covers rent and bills? Is that a reward? I’m not rich…. and I certainly never will be if I continue living here and doing what I am doing for a living now throwing so much money to the wind each month for an apartment I will never own. Honestly, the only good things about living here at this point, are being close to my family, being in a hub of creative, liberal, and open-minded people, the endless amount of things to do, good places to eat, and places to party … oh, and the fact that every decent band or musical artist ALWAYS plays NYC….

  • The only thing I will truly miss about this city when I finally leave, are the abundance of good parties… does Vermont have after-hours?  Does Venice have 24 hour day-time parties?  I don’t think so….

I digress. Back to the food! Cooking is the one thing that a lot of people consider just another chore or something they need to do if they want to eat at the end of the day. I want to live in a place where it’s a way of life – slowly prepared and slowly eaten meals, enjoyed in the company of those you love with copious amounts of wine, and laughter. I want to be a part of a culture where food isn’t processed, cooked and eaten on the fly. Fuck Chipotle, and fucked your Chop’t salads. I want a finely aged balsamic vinegar, I want cured fish, and homemade pasta that it took someone all day to prepare.

I spent my Sunday actually relaxing. For me, this meant not leaving the apartment until 5pm to go to the grocery store. I decided to make another rich soup/stew, and because I wanted to cook a time-consuming dish, one that would allow me the pleasure of standing over the stove stirring a pot for 2 hours while simultaneously chopping produce and sipping wine, I decided to make bouillabaisse, which if you are unfamiliar, is a french seafood/fish stew.

INGREDIENTS:

*** NOTE: This is a pretty expensive dish to make – so I would suggest making for a hot date or a special occasion or cooking for someone you really love and/or someone you want to impress! Feel free to improvise with the fresh seafood – clams can be substituted for the mussels, fresh lobster if you’re feeling extra decadent and rich and willing to cook and clean it separately, or even calamari!***

  • 4 cups (32 Oz.) Seafood Stock
  • A few threads of saffron (** hard to find and really pricey – this shit is like $20 for a few threads…)
  • 1 fillet (about 1 pound) of cod or haddock
  • 1/2 lb. of raw shrimp
  • 1 bag of fresh mussels (clean and scrub outer shells)
  • 1/2 lb. scallops
  • 1 cup white wine (dry, not sweet)
  • 1 small can tomato paste
  • 1-2 cups water
  • 1 large can crushed tomatoes (San Marzano is preferable)
  • 1 small carton of grape or cherry tomatoes, rinsed and halved
  • 2 bay leaves (dried are fine)
  • 2 bulbs of fennel with the stalks attached (you’ll need the feathery leaves) (chop fennel into ribbons – set aside green feathery herb bits)
  • 1 sack of small yellow or red potatoes, chopped in halves (the small round ones, or fingerlings)
  • 2 stalks of celery, finely chopped
  • 4 cloves of garlic, finely minced
  • 1/2 of a white onion, finely chopped
  • 1-2 tsp. cayenne pepper
  • 1 Tablespoon smoked paprika
  • salt and pepper to taste
  • 4 tablespoons olive oil
  • french baguette or a good loaf of french-style peasant bread, sliced, drizzled with olive oil and lightly toasted in over (bake for like 6 minutes at 400 degrees to golden brown)
  • Saffron threads… found in the spice aisle. Literally priced like gold. This will set you back $10-20 depending on weight

DIRECTIONS:

Figure it out yourself.

JK!…. I’m so funny sometimes :p

  1. Heat oil in large soup pot, add in onions and sautee over low heat until translucent and yellow.
  2. Add in garlic AND bay leaves, and continue cooking over low heat for another couple of minutes… DO NOT BURN GARLIC!
  3. Add in fennel and celery, continue cooking over low heat for another 7 minutes or so.
  4. Add in chopped cherry/grape tomatoes and cook for another 5 minutes.
  5. Pour entire box of seafood stock into pot; add in entire can of tomato paste, and entire can of crushed tomatoes; add water as you see fit… probably around 1 cup or so.
  6. Bring to a boil and then reduced heat.
  7. ***OPTIONAL*** (but also preferable): Blend about 3/4 contents of the pot in a blender and return to pot…. this will create a thicker, heartier stew as opposed to a lighter broth. If you are making bouillabaisse in true French style; you would actually blend everything in the pot, and then pass all liquid back through a strainer so as to ONLY have broth and then throw out any remaining pulp/chopped veggies.
  8. Once you have attained the thickness/consistency you prefer for liquid portion of the soup by blending or not blending, straining or not straining, add in the potatoes and bring to boil.
  9. Add in a few threads (a generous pinch) of saffron, along with cayenne pepper, smoked paprika, salt and pepper… this is the part of cooking where you use half your spoons to keep tasting your soup :p
  10. Continue cooking at a low boil until potatoes are soft (use the fork to test).
  11. Add in 1 cup of white wine and reduce heat to low-medium.
  12. Add in the mussels and cook for about 5 minutes.
  13. Add in the shrimp and scallops, cook another 3 minutes.
  14. Add in the fish and cook another 4 minutes.
  15. DO NOT OVERCOOK once the seafood has gone in, so as to avoid tough or rubbery seafood.
  16. Serve hot with toasted bread and garnish of chopped fennel herb!!!
Fennel bulb and fennel “herbs”… those feathery green parts are what you will use for extra garnish and flavor once you serve the soup. Fennel has a structure similar to onions with layers.
  • Onion, garlic, bay leaves, and fennel …. next, the tomatoes go into cook, followed by all of the liquids
I suggest removing the bay leaves, and then blending about half of the contents of the pot once all liquids are added and fennel and tomatoes are soft.
  • Consistency of soup after blending, and before adding potatoes and seafood… thick, and opaque, but not puree or too thick… should still be broth-like
  • Saffron!!!!!
  • Make sure mussels are well scrubbed and rinsed prior to going into soup to eliminate any dirt or grit… also, be careful eating soup; you never know when a shell may have broken off and you don’t want to break your teefs
F*ck yeah …..

Soup For the Soul – New Year’s Introspection and Borscht

Another year has come and gone, and we are back to the boring, dismal, no-holiday-having month that is January. I don’t mind winter – I honestly love winter, as long as there is snow and not the dreary, depressing rain that is falling today. Today’s nasty rain is especially devastating, since most of the pretty Christmas lights have been taken down and everyone has kicked their poor tree to the curb. If snow was falling, I don’t think the city would feel so drab right now. NYC currently feels like a hole I can’t escape from – but we’ll leave that topic for another day.

  • I’m obsessed with Christmas lights and Christmas trees… my aunt and uncle’s tree is always one of my faves because they use those old fashioned bubbler lights

I always get sad when both Christmas and NYE are over…. people return to their foul, sour-faced, pretentious city-dweller dispositions instead of the fake, cheerful ones they assume during the holidays – smiling and wishing everyone well with a smile on their face. Now it’s back to avoiding eye contact and looking miserable with a sour face on the subway. If I ruled the world, every day would be Christmas! I kid, I kid…

Me and my “son,” Mr. Peeper (aka Peeps). We both love Christmas, cheese, and rolling around on the shag carpet

Now that the holidays are officially over, it is time to start planning something to look forward to again and working towards my New Year’s goals (hence me sitting here working on this blog). I am trying to invest more time into writing again, whether it’s about food, short-stories, or just general, self-centered thoughts. The older I have become, the harder it is to find enough time in the day for all the things I not only have to do, but want to do. Work, and commuting to and from work, takes up such a large portion of each day, week, month, and year, that I now truly understand why it is important to love the work you do…. If I can’t make a full time living doing what I want to do at this point in my life, I can at least devote as much time as possible to work towards those goals.

Between work, general household upkeep, maintaining my cat, maintaining relationships, cooking/cleaning, errands, and self-care, it sometimes seems like one more chore to make myself sit in front of my computer at night and write. Although, once I do sit down and start writing, it is never a chore; quite the opposite. Writing is like cooking is for me – pleasurable, relaxing, and often times hard to put a cap on it once I start.

Since we are in the throes of winter (despite the lack of snow thanks to global warming), my next few blogs will focus on comfort food and soups. Honestly though, I’m not sure who I’m trying to kid… pretty much everything I cook seems to constitute as comfort food, given that it’s usually laden with cheese, wine soaked, or carb heavy. Comfort food and comfort soup is the way to go when the weather is cold.

I had never made borscht before, but I had a craving for beets (I’ve always love beets and I always will…) and also for a thick, pureed soup, so it was only natural that borscht was on the menu! Since one of my other New Year’s goals is to completely cut out meat from my diet, I made a vegetarian borscht using vegetable stock in place of beef stock, and obviously did not put any beef in the soup.

  • The finished product: Thick as hell, topped with a dollop of sour cream and fresh dill

INGREDIENTS:

  • 4 fresh, large beets (or 5-6 smaller ones) (**beets should be cleaned, skinned/peeled, and cubed)
  • 2 medium-sized carrots (chopped)
  • 1/2 of a large white onion (finely chopped)
  • 4 cloves of garlic (finely minced)
  • 2 stalks of celery
  • 1 large potato (Idaho or russet)
  • 1 cup thinly chopped cabbage
  • 2 bay leaves (dried are fine)
  • 3 tablespoons of olive oil and/or butter
  • 4 cups (one 32 oz. carton) of vegetable stock
  • 2 tsp smoked paprika
  • 2 TBS white vinegar
  • 1 tsp celery salt
  • pinch of cayenne pepper
  • salt and pepper to taste
  • sour cream*to garnish
  • fresh dill *to garnish
  • YOU WILL NEED A BLENDER OR IMMERSION BLENDER!!!!

DIRECTIONS:

  1. Prep the veggies – the beets should be washed, peeled (using a regular carrot/apple peeler), and cut into cube size chunks; carrots should be chopped, onion finely chopped, garlic finely minced, potato chopped into cubes, celery chopped, and cabbage thinly sliced and set aside (this will go in to cook when everything else has been blended)
  2. In a large pot, heat olive oil and/or butter (I prefer a combination of the two for added richness) over low heat, add in the onions stirring occasionally and cooking over low-heat until translucent and yellow.
  3. Add in the garlic and bay leaves and continue to cook over low heat for another minute or two. DO NOT BURN GARLIC.
  4. Add in all of the other veggies, APART FROM THE CABBAGE (beets, carrots, celery, and potato), and then add in entire container of stock.
  5. Increase heat to medium temperature so that the contents of the pot comes to a low boil. Continue to cook over medium heat for about 25-35 minutes, stirring occasionally. Check to see that vegetables are thoroughly cooked (soft) by poking with a fork. I suggest testing the beets and potatoes this way, since they will be the last to finish cooking.
  6. REMOVE THE BAY LEAVES BEFORE BLENDING!
  7. Using an immersion blender or a ladle to move soup into an actual blender, blend around 3/4 of the contents of the pot of soup. This creates a rich, thick puree, but also leaves some chunks of veggies for texture and aesthetic.
  8. Continue to keep soup over medium heat once fully blended, add in the cabbage, smoked paprika, celery salt, pinch of cayenne, and regular salt/black pepper to suit your tastes (**the smoked paprika gives it a richer, smokier flavor and complements the earthiness of the beets!)
  9. Once the cabbage is cooked through, add in the vinegar and stir
  10. Serve hot, with a generous dollop of sour cream in the middle of the bowl (it takes it to another level that is orgasmic to the taste buds), and some fresh dill.

I also served some potato and cheese pierogies on the side to make it a heartier meal!!!! Very Eastern European…. but hey – when you’re just a boring, fourth-generation American, you’re allowed to pick and choose which 25% of your ethnic background you occasionally want to play up… on this day we went with the polski :p

Such a beautiful color – just be careful you don’t wear white while cooking 😉 Beets are also really good for you – not that I actually give a f*ck, but they’re loaded with fiber and vitamin C

There are so many other soup recipes I plan to share in the upcoming weeks; everything from my mom’s seafood chowder, to a thick-ass split pea soup, to a Tuscan bread soup called Ribollita. I just fucking love soup – I could probably live on a diet of soups, chowders, and stews!