News alert! Perfect soup weather has come to Placer County! January temperatures are cold enough for lots of brimming bowls of piping hot soup and thick warming stew, so grab the kettle and let’s get cooking.
You don’t need to be a chef to make a simple and satisfying soup, and you can use whatever ingredients you have on hand.
If you choose to use dried beans, they will cook faster if you cover them with water and soak overnight. Drain and put in the pot and add water to cover by a couple of inches. Simmer until tender, about 2 hours. Sacramento’s Chili Smith has Black Calypso Beans, Christmas Limas, Hutterite Soup Beans, Good Mother Stallard Beans, and Black Bean Soup Makin’s with seasoning packets all on the NP shelves waiting for your soup pot. Sierra Soups are also on our shelves with several vegetarian bean and lentil based soup mixes.
If you choose to use meat, cut it into bite sized pieces and brown it in the soup pot in a little olive oil or butter. Or, stew a whole chicken or turkey carcass.
To make your soup, first chop up some aromatic vegetables (onion, garlic, celery, and carrot add lots of flavor) and saute in the pot with some fat—butter or olive oil work well. Add your meat and/or beans, along with soup base or broth, other vegetables, seasoning herbs and spices. Simmer for an hour or two and soup is served!
But are you too busy to spend all day cooking? No worries! We’ve taken a cue from the weather and stocked the Newcastle Produce deli with twice as much soup as usual. Enjoy our thick vegan minestrone any day of the week all month long, as well as another different hearty soup each week.