a whisk and a spoon

Everyday Dorie: Tomato and Berry Gazpacho

I made this Tomato and Berry Gazpacho two summers ago now, so it’s not so fresh in my mind. With deep red summer tomatoes and sweet strawberries spiced with ginger, mint and harissa, it is fresh in flavor, and I do remember that. While I could probably chug an entire blender jar of traditional gazpacho pretty easily, I found this one was best in small servings, as Dorie suggested.

For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see how the group liked this one.

Everyday Dorie: Hot or Cold Beet-Fennel Soup

Wow, I had to really hunt around for this photo of Hot or Cold Beet-Fennel Soup. I made it a while back, and I thought that meant late fall of this past year. Turns out I made it in February 2021. Time continues to be a fast-moving blur. 

This is a puréed soup that begins with cooking down fennel and some other aromatics, moves along to simmering beets in stock, and ends with everything soft and whizzed up in the blender. You can serve this soup hot or chilled and garnished with whatever floats your boat (or floats on top of soup). I went chilled, with shaved fennel, crème fraîche, caviar and pink peppercorn. This was nice for lunch, and apparently it is still fresh in my mind, as I thought I made it just a few months ago, but I’ve made some heartier and more flavorful variations of beet borscht even more recently that I’ve liked better. 

For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see how the group liked this one.

Everyday Dorie: Holiday Fish Soup

I’m going out tomorrow for a big Feast of the Seven Fishes dinner, but this Holiday Fish Soup has five fishes in just one pot. To get ready for my soupy celebration, I hit up the seafood guys at the framers’ market and splurged on clams, cod, squid and scallops, and found a few large, shell-on shrimp in my freezer.

Dorie’s soup starts by infusing a broth with some Asian aromatics like lemongrass, shallot, ginger, garlic, lime zest, chiles and scallions. After a quick sauté to release their good stuff, I added water as my broth base and I poached the shrimp (still in their shells for added flavor) and the clams in it to make my own seafood stock of sorts. I strained out the solids, setting aside the cooked clams and shrimp, and added in a sprinkle of granulated dashi to boost the seafood umami. There are a few veggies bobbing around in this soup, too. I used a king oyster mushroom, sweet potato and baby bok choy, and cooked them in the broth along with the rest of the seafood.

Dorie said we’d have more fish than broth with this soup, and I think I needed a bigger bowl to hold it all! I garnished my soup with cilantro, more scallion and chile, a big squeeze of lime juice, as well as a sprinkle of yuzu shichimi togarshi (I skipped the yuzu kosho in the broth). This was spicy and flavorful, and a real treat. Happy holidays!

For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see how the group liked this one.

Everyday Dorie: Clam Chowder My Way

Clam Chowder My Way is chowder with a Thai twist. While “My Way” is really Dorie’s way, I, too, like the flavors of coconut milk, lemongrass, ginger, and lime leaf, so I was definitely game to switch-up the standard New England-style chowda. This version still has potatoes, onions, celery and pancetta (or turkey bacon if you’re really doing it my way), so we are keeping some of the familiar in there, too. 

I made this back in March, when I belonged to an oyster CSA so I could host at-home oyster happy hours with friends. I added the “seafood supplement” to my order, and clams would show up in the rotation every few weeks. I made several different simple steamed clam preparations with them, but figured I’d give this soup a go one week. I regard bottled clam juice with some suspicion, although maybe it’s amazing, I don’t know. Since I had fresh clams, which needed pre-cooking to open up their shells, I was able to use the steaming juices in place of the bottled stuff. Using coconut milk instead of heavy cream makes this lighter than a traditional chowder and lets the Thai aromatics shine. I garnished my soup with cilantro and celery leaves, some sliced jalapeño, a squeeze of lime and a dash of fish sauce. I wish I’d saved a few small clams in the shell to put on top, but I always think of better ways to style a photo while I’m actually eating the food! Will I ever learn?

For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see how the group liked this one.

Everyday Dorie: Roasted Butternut Squash Soup

I feel like I’ve made squash soup every which way I can think of, but this Roasted Butternut Squash Soup has some flavorings that I, in fact, had not thought of before. The squash, along with onions, carrots and garlic are coated in a mix containing maple, cayenne and soy before roasting, and then later they’re all simmered in a gingery broth and pureed. The soup is spiced with cinnamon and star anise…since I don’t have any anise, I subbed these spices for Chinese five-spice. This was good and warming, and I loved these flavors with the squash. I tried to compliment them with my garnishes of scallions, chile crisp and toasted squash seeds.

For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see how the group liked this one.

Everyday Dorie: Green Goddess Sipper, Soup or Shots

It’s summertime, aka salad and chilled soup season. This Green Goddess Sipper, Soup or Shots is a cold soup based on a salad dressing, so it’s peak season over here. To make this, first you need a batch of Dorie’s “Demi-Goddess” dressing, a lighter version of green goddess made with yogurt, buttermilk, avocado, cucumber and lots of herbs. Then you doctor it up with more herbs, another cuke and a zuke, and thin it out with extra buttermilk. All this action takes place in a blender, so you get a creamy, bright green soup you can sip through a straw, eat with a spoon or down as a shot. It’s herbacious and tangy, and a cool way to get your chlorophyll. As a bonus, you can save the “Demi-Goddess” dressing you don’t use in it for your next salad.

For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see how the group liked this one.

Everyday Dorie: Moroccan-Spiced Chickpea and Noodle Soup

It’s now been almost a year that I’ve been providing daily WFH lunch (with clean-up service) to the other person in this house, and I’m always looking to cook things that will do double duty as dinner one night and lunch the next with minimal extra effort. Bonus points for things that make enough for a couple of lunches, as is the case with this Moroccan-Spiced Chickpea and Noodle Soup. This soup is Dorie’s version of harira, a traditional Moroccan soup with tomatoes, chickpeas, lentils and lots of spices. I’ve seen recipes for versions of harira with and without meat, and versions with and without noodles…this one has both, so it’s very hearty and filling.

The optional meat in this soup comes in the form of meatballs, or really balls of meat, as they’re just straight-up ground meat (I used turkey) rolled into small balls. While they do cook in the simmering soup, the balls can definitely use some s&p or they will be under-seasoned.

Overall, though, this soup is very flavorful. I did reduce the 3.5 tablespoons of ground ginger, which sounded like so much (I didn’t even have that much!), it was possibly a typo. Not sure about that, so I’m interested to see what others did. I left out the saffron entirely because my small supply was already reserved for something else, and this soup has so many other strong, fragrant spices in the mix that I thought I could get away with it. The noodles I cooked in separate pot, because I knew I’d have leftovers and didn’t want them to get bloated while sitting in the soup.

For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see how the group liked this one.