Curry Roasted Jerusalem Artichokes Soup

This past Saturday, at the farmers market, I was able to get Jerusalem Artichokes or Sunchokes. I had found several recipes to make soup, but one in particular caught my attention.

This recipe fascinated me. Unlike many of the other recipes, you roast instead of boil the Jerusalem Artichokes. The recipe had no milk or potatoes in it, and the soup was still cream looking. You can add a splash of milk or cream to the pot if you prefer to make it even more velvety than it already is. I topped my bowl with butter garlic croutons. I did add a handful of cheese to one bowl. I didn’t see that it added to the taste or even enhanced the soup in anyway.

This is simple to make. Just like the Chili Verde, it has a few steps, but is well worth it. When you peel the Jerusalem Artichokes don’t worry if you can’t get every bit of skin off these knobby beauties.

 Ingredients

1 pound Jerusalem Artichokes

1 onion, diced

4 cups water

2 tablespoon Butter

2 Tablespoon Chicken broth base or bullion

2 teaspoons Curry powder

2 teaspoons Garam Masala

3 Tablespoons Olive oil

 

Directions

Preheat oven to 355°F

Peel the Jerusalem artichokes, and then roughly chop

 Rinse the pieces and transfer to a large bowl

To the bowl add Olive Oil, Garam Masala and the Curry Powder

 Mix well until each piece is well coated with oil and spices

 Transfer to a glass roasting dish and place in the oven for about 40 minutes, or until golden brown.

 

 Five minutes before the artichokes are finished roasting

In a 3 quart sauce pot, melt the butter over medium heat

Add onion, lightly sauté until it starts to become translucent

Add water and chicken broth base to pot

Add in the roasted Jerusalem artichokes (make sure you scrape any bits into left in the roasting dish into the pot)

Bring pot to a simmer, cover and lower the temperature slightly

Allow the soup to slowly simmer for about 20 minutes

Blend thoroughly using the Hand Blender until smooth

If adding milk or cream (1/4 cup) do so before serving

Top with croutons before serving

Double chocolate chip cookies

I am always looking for a new recipe for chocolate chip cookies. I really dislike when you are baking and the last batch hardly has any chocolate chips. I also do not care for how after a few days even when kept in airtight container cookies tend to get hard.

I was playing with another recipe I came up with these. At the moment, I am calling those cow pie cookies, because even though they are chocolaty and chewy, they are flat and look like cow pies… I will post the recipe when I get it perfected.

This recipe is a bit different in that there is no white sugar and has cinnamon in them. The family devoured these. I hid a few and week later they were still fairly soft, this is great news for all those early Christmas cookie makers!

Ingredients

½ cup butter

½ cup shortening

1 ½ cups packed brown sugar

1 teaspoon baking soda

½ teaspoon ground cinnamon

2 eggs

2 teaspoons vanilla

2 ½ cups flour

11 ½ ounces milk chocolate chips (I used Nestle)

11 ½ ounces dark chocolate chips (I used Nestle)

 

Directions

 

Preheat oven to 350°F

In large mixing bowl beat butter and shortening, with mixer on medium for 30 seconds

Add brown sugar, baking soda and cinnamon beat until combined

Scrape sides of bowl if needed, beat in eggs and vanilla

Add flour one cup at a time until thoroughly mixed in

With a wooden spoon stir in chocolate chips

Drop heaping teaspoons of dough 2inches apart on ungreased cookie sheets.

Bake for 9 to 11 minutes, or until edges are set, remove from oven and let cookies rest for 2 minutes before transferring to wire cooling racks.