Chicken Vegetable Soup in a Hurry

Sometimes you just don’t have time for a soup to simmer all day. You need soup in a hurry, but you are still crave something fresh and good, you just want it now. Try this recipe for instant soup relief. I came up with it when I faced a similar dilemma. I was looking in my fridge and pantry to see what I could do to soothe that soup craving when I spotted the food processor and thought “aha, I’ll shred the vegetables for speedier cooking.” No food processor? Try chopping the veggies into a really small dice.

Sheer genius. Sheer delicious. Even if I do say so myself.

Do try to use the Moroccan raz el hanout seasoning (sometimes spelled ras el hanout). It adds a mysterious curry-like note with a bit of floral and a bit of heat. I’ve suggested a replacement mixture just in case it’s not right there on your spice shelf. (I got mine in Paris; remind me to tell you about it someday.) Here is a recipe if you would like to make the spice blend up yourself. The lemon zest and juice add a nice, clean tingle to the fresh taste of the vegetables, the earthiness of the chickpeas and the light spiciness.

Chicken Vegetable Soup in a Hurry
Makes about 8 servings

You can make this Vegetable Vegetable Soup by substituting vegetable stock for the chicken.

Note: Cut vegetables in 1 to 2 inch chunks before shredding, so your shreds are bite site.

2 tablespoons olive oil or grapeseed oil or mixed
1 medium onion chopped
2-3 garlic cloves, minced
Pinch dried red pepper flakes
2 large carrots, shredded
1 medium-large red bell pepper, shredded
2 large zucchinis, shredded
Salt and pepper
¼ teaspoon Moroccan raz el hanout seasoning (recommended if available) OR ¼ teaspoon combined TOTAL of equal parts ground turmeric, ground cinnamon and ground ginger
1 tablespoon grated lemon rind
1 quart good quality chicken broth (homemade or store bought)
1 -15 ounce can of chickpeas, drained
1 tablespoon lemon juice
Chunks of avocado and fresh tomato for garnish (optional)
Chopped fresh cilantro for garnish (optional)


Heat oil in a large soup pot over medium high heat. Add onion and sauté until beginning to turn translucent and soften. Add garlic. Sauté until garlic is beginning to brown. Sprinkle in the red pepper flakes and stir and fry to release the flavors. Add the shredded vegetables and sauté until beginning to soften. Add salt and pepper to taste and the Moroccan or other substitute seasonings, lemon rind, chicken broth and drained chick peas. Bring mixture to a simmer, cover and cook until vegetables are tender, broth is heated through and the tastes have melded. Stir in lemon juice. Taste and correct seasonings if need be. Serve with selected garinsh(es) if desired.

This just occurred to me -- If you are planning in advance to make this soup, you can probably find shredded vegetables at a supermarket salad bar. That will speed things up even more. You can also add some leftover roasted chicken meat to the soup for a heartier meal.

Turkish Greens, Roasted Potato and Portobello Mushroom Stew

The Well Fed Network's Paper Palate site has published my roundup of my favorite Jewish cookbooks.

I really put those books through their paces this current Jewish holiday season. My menu ended up featuring the foods of the Turkish Sephardic Jewish community. A large reason for that was in remembrance of a friend who was of Turkish Sephardic heritage who was a wonderful cook.

From Olive Trees and Honey I read up on some of the Turkish holiday food traditions. I also made some wonderful pumpkin pastries called borekas from that book. I took a number of ideas from a variety of cookbooks and added my own touches to create a Sephardic chicken soup with vegetables and matzoh-fafalel dumplings. From the Book of Jewish Food I adapted a recipe and created a chicken and black-eyed pea dish for my main course. I also served a vegetarian main dish of greens, potatoes and portobello mushrooms which was inspired from a traditional Turkish recipe. My version was adapted from the book Vegetarian Turkish Cooking by Carol Robertson. My recipe is very different from hers, but she deserves credit for sparking my imagination.

As part of a mezze or appetizer plater I served small hot-sweet pickled cherry peppers stuffed with hummus (chickpea dip). Noah made apple pie for dessert. Now, apple pies aren't traditional Turkish Sephardic food, but apples are a European tradition for the Jewish New Year and Noah does like making apple pies, so that's how that came about.

Here's my greens stew recipe. It is very flavorful and flexible. You can use other types of greens and it can be a main dish or side dish.

Turkish Greens with Potatoes and Portobello Mushrooms
Serves four as a main course, more as a side dish

Olive oil or olive oil spray
2 large potatoes, peeling optional, cut into 1" chunks (I used yellow finn, but regular baking potatoes work well)
1/4 to 1 teaspoon red pepper flakes (depending on how spicy you like your food)
salt and pepper
3 tablespoons butter or olive oil
3 onions, chopped
2 cloves garlic, chopped
2 pounds of portobello mushrooms, wiped cleaned, stems discarded, black gills cut away (see note) and cut into 1" chunks
2 pounds of fresh mixed greens washed and cut into large, bite size pieces (I used a mixture of chard, collard and turnip, but you could use beet, spinach, mustard or kale as well)
1 teaspoon sugar
1 cup of vegetable stock or water
2 medium tomatoes, chopped
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 teaspoon vinegar

First roast the potatoes. Preheat an oven to 450 degrees. Grease a baking pan with olive oil or oil spray. Add potatoes. Brush the potatoes with a bit more oil or use spray. Sprinkle with red pepper and salt and pepper to taste. Put in oven and roast until cooked through and browned, turning potatoes occassionally. This should take approximately 45 minutes or so.

While the potatoes are roasting make the stew. Melt the butter (or heat the oil) in a large saucepot with a lid. Add the onions and saute for a minute or two until beginning to soften and then add the garlic. Saute to until the garlic is just beginning to brown. Add the mushroom chunks and continue to saute for a few minutes. Add the greens. Mix well with the mushrooms and saute a minute or two. Add the sugar and the vegetable stock or water. Add salt and pepper to taste. Mix well and bring to a boil. Lower heat to a simmer and put lid on pot. Cook covered for 20 minutes or until the greens have cooked through. Taste and correct seasoning. (Add more sugar if the greens are too bitter, more salt and pepper if they are too bland.)

Prepare the tomatoes. Toss the tomato chunks with oil, vinegar and salt and pepper to taste. Set aside.

When the greens are cooked, assemble the dish. Put the greens and mushroom mixture in a large serving bowl. Add in roasted potatoes and toss until combined. Top with a wide ribbon of the tomato salad mixture as a garnish.

Note: Portobello mushrooms have dark brown-black gills under the cap. These gills darken any stewed mixture they are in. To avoid this, simply slice the gills off the underside the mushroom caps after you remove the stems. This is an optional step, but I do it whenever I want to avoid the coloration issue.