Suppa Club #1- Cheese and Potato Soup

I have joined an online supper club that Molly from Batter Splattered started. The premise was that we would all have one meal "together" each week. In the end we agreed that it would be difficult to all have our meal on the same night. This week Molly and a few others are making their soup on Friday. David and I will be at Bad Girls of the North friday night followed by the beer tasting at the Carlson Center. We will be eating brats and potato salad according to the flyer. So, in the end the supper club decided that we would all cook the same recipe sometime during the week. Each week a different person will host the supper by choosing the recipe. We are free (and encouraged) to make any changes as we see fit. To start things off Molly chose a potato soup...

Cheese and Potato Soup
Bon Appetit December 1995

Serves 4.

2 tablespoons vegetables oil
1/2 cup chopped celery
1/2 cup chopped carrot
1/2 cup chopped onion
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
3 tablespoons all purpose flour
2 cups canned low-salt chicken broth
2 cups milk
1 10- to 12-ounce russet potato, peeled, diced
1 cup packed shredded sharp cheddar cheese (about 4 ounces)
1/2 cup chopped ham
Hot pepper sauce (such as Tabasco)
Chopped fresh parsley

Heat oil in heavy large saucepan over medium heat. Add celery, carrot, onion and thyme and sauté until vegetables begin to soften, about 5 minutes. Sprinkle flour over and stir 2 minutes. Gradually whisk in broth, then milk. Add potato and bring soup to boil. Reduce heat and simmer soup until potato is tender, about 20 minutes. Add cheese 1/3 cup at a time, stirring until melted and smooth after each addition. Mix in ham. Season soup to taste with hot pepper sauce, salt and pepper. Sprinkle with parsley and serve.

The results: This soup is a very simple easily adaptable recipe(check out the Bon Appetite site for even more variations). I think I was a little overambitious considering it was the first recipe for the supper club. First off, I am not a big fan of ham, so I knew right away that I would substitute bacon. Then, I doubled the recipe. I used all local veggies from our farmer’s market. The addition of red and blue potatoes would give the soup a nice color. Fresh thyme from my herb garden was substituted for the dried thyme. Medium white cheddar cheese was used instead of the sharp cheddar so the color of the veggies would stand out more. Also, I had a lot of leeks so I used them instead of the onion. When cooking the potatoes I put a few in a pot on the side with half of the chicken broth, when cooked I pureed them with an immersion blender and then added this to the soup. In the end, the combination of leeks, bacon, and the white cheddar made the soup somewhat bitter. It didn’t help that I burned the bacon slightly. The pureed potatoes made the soup a weird consistency, almost as though the milk had curdled (it didn’t). The soup was still good, I am eating it for lunch today. Next time, I won’t make quite so many changes!