Soup burbling on the back burner comforts me when cold winds circle the house and rattle the windows. Stocks coaxed from turkey carcasses, chicken backs, ham shanks and oven-roasted beef bones roiled on my stove over the years each winter to be transformed to noodle soups, pea, bean and barley soups and stews.
The switch I made to cook with more vegetables, no fat and little meat didn’t bode well for stock making until vegetarian friends Mike and Rachel mentioned a lovely vegetable stock recipe Deborah Madison wrote for The Greens Cookbook, Extraordinary Vegetarian Cuisine from the Celebrated Restaurant.
I’d forgotten how much I liked this book when Madison first published it in 2001. The library had an updated version waiting on the shelves. Borrowing books makes financial sense for me, keeps cookbook-fever in check and helps me stay current with trends and techniques.
In the chapter called Soups and Stocks, Madison explains how to build flavors with vegetables, herbs and spices. She catalogs what qualities each ingredient brings to the stock and which ones play well together. She also provides recipes for spring and winter vegetable stocks, wild mushroom stock, even a stock for curried soups and stews.
Madison’s words challenged me to think about soups in new ways. She understands and shares how to develop flavor combinations. The meaty taste of eggplant, the earthy quality of kale or chard, the sweetness of parsnips and carrots, the tartly acidic note of tomatoes -- each brings a unique note to the stock. Generous amounts of parsley, lots of garlic, and sweet leeks and onions round out flavor.
Some vegetables don’t work in a simmering stock: cauliflower, brussels sprouts, artichokes, beets and spinach. Madison cites strong cooking odors, colors bleeding or acrid tastes as the reasons for exclusion.
Following her guidelines, my stocks turned out full-flavored and lush. Plus, vegetable stocks don’t take forever to make. Most vegetables give up their flavors in thirty minutes as opposed to the hours of cooking beef bones. Be sure to try several of her recipes and don’t hesitate to make up your own. Her directions inspire confidence.
Taste didn’t suffer in these healthier alternatives to meat stocks. The soups, pilafs and casseroles I’ve cooked satisfy my tummy and my conscience. Here’s a close adaptation of Madison’s wild mushroom stock, sans fats, plus a simple barley soup fragrant with onions, celery, carrots and portabello mushrooms for snowy days. Enjoy.
Wild Mushroom Stock
(closely adapted from Deborah Madison)
Yield: 7 to 8 cups
1 cup hot water
1 ounce dried porcini mushrooms
3 tablespoons cold water
2 teaspoons tamari (optional) *see note
4 ounces baby bella mushrooms, caps and stems, roughly chopped
2 medium carrots, peeled and diced
2 celery stalks, diced
1 medium onion, peeled and chopped
1 cup leek greens, cut in 1-inch pieces
1/4 teaspoon ground thyme
6 to 8 branches fresh flat-leaf Italian parsley, roughly chopped, both leaves and stems
Large pinch of dried sage
2 large cloves garlic, peeled and chopped
1/2 teaspoon salt
9 cups cold water
- Cover porcinis with hot water and let stand for 15 minutes.
- Heat water in a large pot or Dutch oven until it bubbles at the edges. Add tamari. Add all vegetables, herbs, garlic and salt and cook over medium-high heat 5 to 7 minutes, stirring often.
- Add the dried mushrooms and their soaking liquid. Add 9 cups cold water. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to a simmer and cook 45 minutes.
- Strain the stock through a fine-mesh sieve. Discard and compost solids.
- Stock is ready to use, or it can be reduced by cooking further over low heat.
- Pour into containers and refrigerate or freeze.
- This stock freezes well in ice cube trays. Single cubes can be used to cook with rice, grains or poured over steamed vegetables for a flavor burst.
Note: tamari is a fermented soy product, a little stronger and sweeter than soy sauce, that heightens flavor. It’s available at Whole Foods, some groceries, Asian and international markets.
Mushroom Barley Soup
Serves 2 for a main dish or 4 as a starter soup
3 cups wild mushroom stock
1 small (2-inch) onion, sliced into thin rings, separated
1 rib celery, washed, trimmed and cut in slices
1 large carrot, peeled and sliced in rounds
1/2 cup cooked pearled barley* (see note)
4 to 6 baby bella mushrooms, stems and caps, cleaned and sliced
2 branches fresh Italian flat-leaf parsley, stems removed, leaves roughly chopped
- Bring mushroom stock to a low boil in a saucepan. Add onions, celery and carrots. Cook over medium low heat 10 minutes.
- Add cooked pearled barley, stir, cover and cook 5 minutes longer.
- Add mushrooms and cook an additional 5 to 10 minutes.
- Stir in parsley. Remove from heat and let stand, covered for 2 to 3 minutes.
- Ladle into warmed bowls. Serve with whole-grain bread and low-fat hummus or yogurt cheese.
Note:
Keeping cooked whole grains like barley, brown rice and kamut in the refrigerator saves time and effort. For this soup, I sometimes like to add whole oats (not steel cut) and cook them as a grain. Here’s a link to an Mary Ann O’Reilly’s recipe for oatmeal soup recipe in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch where I learned this trick.
