My Favorite Meal: Chicken Soup (with a little help from the vegans)

This week was major payback for those few weeks back in December and January (and February and March) when most of the country was buried under snow and San Francisco had days of solid, warm sun. I knew this was coming; some might even say I deserved it.

You know, it's funny, I said to a friend in New York who, at the time, couldn't stop using the word "snowmageddon." The weather in San Francisco is amazing right now. I feel so removed from the plight of the rest of the country. There's, like, a snow emergency in D.C., the federal government has even shut down, and I'm not wearing a jacket over here!

Yeah, that's funny. Hey, I have to go, she responded. They're closing the office. The PATH trains are shutting down. This snowmageddon is crazy. So, I don't want to get stuck here.

Yeah, yeah. With comments like those, I asked for it this week: The unacceptably cold wind and the pelting rain and hail, while the rest of you enjoy unseasonably warm temperatures.

We broke a record today! My mother shrieked on Friday. The record we broke was from 1986. Do you remember that day? In 1986? You were there. It was right after your brother was born. It was so warm, and I was itching to get out of the house, but I had this new baby, it was overwhelming. But it was so nice outside! Wouldn't it be funny if you remembered that? Do you remember that?

No, I don't. But hey. I wore a sweater today.

The cold weather made me want to make large batches of comforting hot food to carry me through the week. To hunker down with the cats, curled up at the foot of the bed, keeping my toes warm. To turn all of the baseboard heaters in the apartment up way past the "Comfort Zone" (as indicated on the thermostats that sit on the wall of every room) and roast in the musty dust smell that's so characteristic of cheap electric heaters that haven't been used in a while.

So I made a big dish of veggie lasagna and allowed the cats in the bedroom while we slept, even though I knew I'd be awakened by one (or both) of them sniffing my ear in the middle of the night. I even let Girlfriend keep the heat on in the living room overnight so that I wouldn't freeze when I left the bedroom in the morning.

Lasagna's always a safe bet for warm winter (spring?) comfort food, and this one was no exception (and it provided us with several lunches during the week, which meant that I didn't have to leave the office and face the rain to find a sandwich). But soup--soup. Soup is the ultimate "this weather sucks, there's a vitamin D deficiency on the horizon if I don't see sun soon" meal. So when Girlfriend complained of a sore throat on Saturday, I immediately responded with soup.



Unwilling to re-layer outwear and go out again to get cornmeal for cornbread after a day of running around, I pulled together a sour cream muffin recipe. It used nutmeg. Turns out, nutmeg isn't much of a flavor complement to chicken soup...

I've never made chicken soup before, but my mom has, so I knew it had to be easy enough. I checked my intuition (place raw, bone-in chicken bits in pot with water, boil with chopped veggies, add noodles, done) against the standard chicken broth recipe in the JoC and improvised from there.

I went through a brief vegan phase a few years ago and read the Vegan Planet cookbook pretty much end-to-end to acclimate myself to dairy-free, meat-free livin'. I quickly failed at the vegan thing, but I did learn quite a bit about preparing flavor-rich foods from the cookbook, and those kinds of lessons last a lifetime, even when your dietary choices don't. For example, leaving the (clean) skins on your veggies when you prepare a soup (enhances the flavor). Adding tamari to broths (deepens the color, also enhances flavor). Using garlic and onions liberally (they're a natural cold remedy, thus a perfect addition to soup).

The chicken soup was delicious. It almost made Girlfriend weep. (This is our personal barometer for assessing delicious food. Is it so good that it makes you cry? I've full-on wept for food twice in my life: Once, when eating scallops at Bar Tartine in the Mission; the second time, savoring, again, oddly enough, a scallop dish at a Peruvian restaurant called Andina in Portland.)

I started the soup with a full pot of cold water; a leg and a half of chicken, bone-in; minced garlic; green onions; green garlic; and a tablespoon of tamari. After bringing to a boil and simmering for 30 minutes, I added the standard mirepoix (onion, carrot, and celery, which had been chopped in a food processor--ding! Another awesome usage of what's quickly becoming my favorite kitchen gadget); parsley; leeks; and mushrooms. I let that simmer for 40 minutes, removed the chicken, cut it into bits, then re-added to the stock with a cup of alphabet noodles. Once the noodles were cooked, the soup was done.

I'm hoping that curing my girlfriend's impending cold with delicious homemade soup is enough to fend off the bad weather karma I assumed after my insensitive response to snowmageddon. Because that's how it works, right?

Chocolate Basil Cupcakes With Toasted Almond Buttercream Frosting

This is my second guest post at Meals; for Moderns, my friend Becky's awesome vegetarian food blog. As I mentioned before, I'm doing a series of three recipes that highlight fresh herbs in tasty baked goods.

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Over the past year or so--since I've started exploring the potential of the kitchen, especially in the realm of delicious and interesting baked goods--I've learned (from experience, mind you) that the following items do not substitute for a food processor:

• A Kitchenaid mixer--neither the whisk nor the knead attachment
  
• A fork
• Two forks
  
• A hammer

I've I wanted to try a basil-chocolate cake recipe for a while now (something about how basil borders on an almost licorice-like flavor made it seem like a good complement to a velvety chocolate cake). I knew I'd need a food processor (not a hammer) to do it--I kept reading over and over that the way to go is to finely chop basil with granulated sugar using a food processor. I wasn't so sure I was ready to commit to an actual food processor, though. It seems like something that adults get when they're comfortable and settled in a place, and I'm not ready to admit that I'm an adult who's never leaving San Francisco (even though it's true).

But, because I kind of promised Becky that I would blog about using fresh herbs in baked goods, and because I told her about the basil chocolate cupcake idea and she got excited, I felt like I had no choice. I had pretty much backed myself into a corner, and probably on purpose so I would actually do it. And I did: I broke down and bought a cute, 3-cup, royal blue food processor this weekend. I immediately fell in love.

To really take the food processor thing to the next level, I came up with a frosting recipe that would use it, too. (I might as well call these "food processor cupcakes.") But if you're not a nut fan, a simple vanilla buttercream would pair nicely with the cake as well (and wouldn't require additional food processor time).

Chocolate Basil Cupcakes With Toasted Almond Buttercream Frosting

(Note: I accidentally bought jumbo baking cups at Safeway, so I ended up making 17 gigantic cupcakes instead of two-dozen or so normal-sized cupcakes. That also explains why they turned out kind of ugly and misshapen. In a non-jumbo world, this recipe would probably make 24-36 cupcakes.)



The Cupcake Part

This recipe is adapted from epicurious.com. It rivals my all-time favorite chocolate stout layer cake recipe from the same place--in fact, I might go so far as to say it's better.

2 c unbleached all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 c unsweetened baking cocoa
1/3 c semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 c boiling water
2 c sugar
1 c fresh basil leaves
3 large eggs
1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
1 c whipping cream
1 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line muffin tins with (NOT JUMBO! Please!!) baking cups.

Sift flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a medium-sized bowl. In a smaller bowl, add cocoa and chocolate chips. Pour the 1 c boiling water over the cocoa/chocolate chip mixture and whisk until smooth.

In a food processor, chop 1 c of sugar and the fresh basil until the sugar turns an even bright green color.

In a mixer, beat the 1 c basil/sugar mixture, the remaining 1 c sugar, and eggs until light and fluffy. Add butter to the mixture and beat until blended. Beat in the cocoa mixture. Add whipping cream and vanilla; beat to blend. Mix in dry ingredients on low until just blended.

Fill muffin tins until about 2/3 full. Bake for 18-20 minutes (I think--the jumbo cupcakes took 30 minutes...), or until a toothpick inserted into the cupcakes comes out clean.

The Frosting Part

This is a simple, straightforward adaptation of the quick buttercream frosting recipe on the Food Network website.

2 c raw almonds
3 c confectioners' sugar
1 c butter, softened
1 tsp vanilla extract
1-2 tbsp whipping cream

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Spread almonds out on a baking sheet and toast for 5-10 minutes, or until the almonds brown. Let almonds cool for 2 minutes, then grind in food processor with 1 c of confectioners' sugar until fine.

Using a stand mixer with the whisk attachment, mix, on low speed, almond/sugar mixture, the remaining 2 c of confectioners' sugar, and butter until well-blended. Increase speed to to medium and beat for 3 minutes.

Add vanilla and whipping cream and continue to beat for another 1 minute more. Add more cream as necessary to achieve a spreadable consistency.