Broccoli Soup

Last month we visited New Hampshire to see the Fall Colors. Oh Boy! It was freezing cold and all we had were our fall jackets. Not much use but something was better than nothing. Yeah that is when I felt like having hot sambar vadai's and pepper rasam. (If you are wondering if I am drooling as I write this, then you guessed it right.) We headed to Subway (I am a big fan) to eat the buns and veggies only to find about 30 other Indians standing in the line before us. With the number of Indian's visiting that place I was surprised that there were no Indian restaurants. With the temperatures soaring down, weathers getting cooler there is nothing better than sipping on nice hot/warm soup.

The temperature as I write this post is 39 F i.e. 3.88 C. Thanks to Google I do not have to calculate using the 5/9 formula or maybe it is 9/5. Oh my God! How dependent I have become on Google that I do not know the basic formula itself. Coming back to the main part of this post. With only broccoli in hand, I decided to make it into a soup which I would say turned out to be good enough to be slurped down completely in 5 minutes. Here we go with the recipe:

Ingredients

Broccoli - 1.5 cup (chopped into florets)

Milk - 2 cups (I used 2%. If you want to make it low fat then milk - 1 cup and water - 1 cup)

Water - 1 cup

Flour - 1 tbsp

Onion - 1 (chopped finely)

Salt - as per taste

Cheese - 2 tbsp (I used reduced fat cheese)

Oil - 1 tbsp

Preparation

Heat oil. Add onion and fry till it is translucent. Add flour and mix thoroughly ensuring that it does not stick to the bottom of the vessel. Add milk and mix well. Allow it to simmer for 5 minutes. The mixture would have thickened by now. Add broccoli florets and water. Mix well. If you still find the mixture to be too thick you can add some more water. Add salt. Allow it to simmer till the broccoli is cooked well. Add cheese and mix well. Transfer to soup bowls. Broccoli soup is ready and yummy!

Note: Once the broccoli florets are cooked you can blend the entire mixture thoroughly to get a smooth creamy texture. If you are like me and like the pieces floating around skip the blending part.

~ Ramya

Low Fat Corn and Zucchini Soup

Mornings are business as usual with interactions with my team located in India and the time usually flies. Cornflakes and oats are great breakfast items especially when you are working. During weekends, N gets up late so there is only direct lunch, which gives me some free time in the mornings. But the rest of day is packed with all my cooking experiments (that is how N likes to call it). With my current dieting plan, I have been searching for simple and easy recipes. I have been searching for low calorie and low fat recipes in foodnetwork.com when I came across this Creamy Corn and Vegetable Soup. I adapted the recipe to make Corn and Zucchini soup. Here we go with my adaptation:

Ingredients

Corn Kernels - 1 cup (I used the frozen, thawed)

Skim Milk - 1 cup (I used 1%)

Onion - 1/4 cup (chopped finely)

Zucchini - 1 (medium sized, grated)

Water - 2 cups

Salt - as per taste

Ground black pepper - as per taste

Oil - 1 tsp

Preparation

Blend corn kernels and skim milk until smooth and keep aside. Heat oil over medium heat. Add onion and saute till onions are tender. Add zucchini and stir till zucchini is tender, about 3 minutes. Add water and bring to a boil. Add salt. Allow it to simmer for 5-7 minutes. Add pureed corn until warmed. Do not allow it come to a boil. Season with pepper.

Corn & Zucchini soup is ready and yummy!!!

Since this gets done in less than 20 minutes, I am sending this to Twenty-20 Cooking Event