Jalapeno Corn Soup with Seared Scallops

After getting back home from a two week long trip overseas I was dying to cook, bake, clean.  Basically all things domestic were calling my name.  I was also expecting to get home to some chilly fall weather here in Portland.  But as it turned out it's still fairly sunny and hot here so I decided to milk a little bit more summer fare out of the dwindling days.

As you can see here; I'm pretty into corn.  Especially summer corn.  So I saw this recipe and decided to go for it.  I also am such a novice when it comes to scallops.  I'd never even eaten a scallop until probably 3 years ago and I've never cooked them - until now.  Turns out they are super simple and the satisfaction you get from searing one off and seeing the caramelization is deeply gratifying.

I changed a couple of things on this recipe.  Mainly I used coconut milk instead of cream and subbed olive oil for the butter to make it dairy free.  I also cut down on one of the jalapeno peppers thinking it'd be too spicy but in retrospect that was a mistake so I've listed it back to the original two.  I hope you enjoy this, be it these last weeks of summer, or maybe save it for next year!

Jalapeno Corn Soup
adapted from Food 52

• 9 ears of corn, kernels removed and 4 cobs reserved
• 1 onion, diced
• 2 jalapeños, seeded and diced
• 3 cloves of garlic, peeled and minced
• 4 cups low-sodium chicken stock
• 1/2 cup unsweetened coconut milk
• 3 tablespoons oil
•  Salt and pepper

Melt the oil over medium heat in a large heavy pot or dutch oven. Add in the onion and jalapeño and cook for 5 to 7 minutes, or until soft but not brown. Add in the garlic and the corn kernels and cook for another minute or until fragrant, making sure that the garlic doesn't burn.  Pour in the chicken stock and coconut milk and add the corn cobs. Season with a few large pinches of salt and pepper. Bring soup to a boil, lower to a simmer, and cook for about 45 minutes.  Discard the cobs and blend the soup until smooth. Check for seasoning and add more salt and pepper if needed.  Ladle the soup into a shallow bowl and top with seared scallops. Soup can also be cooled and refrigerated for a few days or frozen for a couple months.

Seared Scallops

•     12 large sea scallops, preferably fresh and/or dry-packed
•     1 tablespoon olive oil
•     1 tablespoon neutral oil, like canola or grapeseed
•     Salt and pepper

Melt the butter and oil together in a large heavy skillet until very hot, but not smoking.  Rinse the scallops, pat very dry, and season generously with salt and pepper.  Add the scallops to the pan and cook for 2 to 3 minutes per side, or until caramelized on the outside and just slightly translucent in the center.

Fresh Corn Polenta - with a side of BBQ Chicken and Balsamic Pepper Flake Chard

Let's just get one thing straight right off the bat.  This post is all about the Fresh Corn Polenta.  When I stumbled across this recipe I thought - must try, immediately.  This recipe is the epitome of summer.  I'd say if it didn't require turning on the stove (for like 10 minutes, tops) it might be the king of the summer recipes.  But we can't all be perfect, can we?  Anyhow, please do give this recipe a go.  It requires little work, few ingredients, and a huge pay off.  Summer corn is one of life's simple pleasures and this, this my friends, is the way to highlight it.

As I grated the corn for the polenta I had one of those "no duh" moments with the realization that the starch that's hiding in the cob of the corn pockets is what naturally thickens this polenta right up.  I mean, where the heck did I think corn starch comes from? Tomatoes? Don't answer that.

I decided to top my polenta off with some super simple chicken marinated in BBQ sauce and a sautee of rainbow chard.  I dressed the chard with red pepper flakes and balsamic to give it some heat and acid to bounce off the super sweet corn polenta.  This meal was so good.  I give it two very enthusiastic thumbs up.

Fresh Corn Polenta
from here
Serves 3

• 5 ears of corn - I used sweet white but feel free to use the less sweet yellow
• 1 tablespoon of butter + 1 tablespoon olive oil
• Salt and Pepper
• Parmesan, grated (optional)

Clean the corn, removing all husks and silk threads. Working over a bowl, grate the corn using the large grate side of a box grater.  You will end up with a pulpy wet mixture.  Melt the butter and olive oil in a saucepan over medium heat.  Add the grated corn, stir in some salt and pepper. Allow mixture to cook over medium low heat, stirring it often so it doesn't burn, until it becomes thick.  Serve immediately with some grated parmesan, if using.

To make a full meal of this, add whatever sauteed green suits your fancy and some protein.  Really you can't go wrong with whatever you decide to whip up and add on top.  Happy Summer!

Quatro of Smooth Soups with Grilled Cheese

Quatro? Quartet? It doesn't matter. The point is that we made four soups at once and dunked grilled cheese into them and they all were tasty.  I had this idea buzzing around in my head for quite a while after visiting the Picnic House in SW Portland last year, where they serve a trio of soups with little grilled cheese slices.  I have not really ever been a fan of pureed soups, but I enjoyed the dunking aspect and taste comparisons of having multiple soup options for dunking. 

It was kind of a crazy idea to make four soups at once, and V also commented as such, but I stuck to it and I am glad I did. I am also so glad I enlisted V to help me with this because otherwise I probably would have pulled out my hair or given up.  Also, since V gave me an immersion blender for my birthday, it was the perfect chance to put it to use!  Another total bonus about making four soups at once is that now my freezer is stocked full of soups for rainy days to come! 

Vanessa, Matthew, and I all had different rankings of these soups, and even the expectations of which we would like best turned out to be wrong. This was a fun experiment, but I won't be making four soups at once again anytime soon!

My rankings: Curried Butternut, Tomato/Pepper, Zucchini Basil, Roasted Cauliflower. I expected to like the Cauliflower the best.
Vanessa's rankings: Curried Butternut, Tomato/Pepper, Cauliflower, Zucchini Basil.  V expected to like the Zucchini soup the best.
Matthew's rankings:  Tomato/Pepper, Cauliflower,Curried Butternut, Zucchini Basil.  Matthew ate the zucchini one first and said it was great but then each one he ate after that he liked more.  (It's nice to cook for this guy, he loves everything!)


(Please forgive the super 90s food styling here, I didn't really plan that out and these are the only dishes I had that were appropriate!)

I pulled these recipes from various sources, and chose recipes with few ingredients and that did not use cream, as we intended to dunk grilled cheese into them and why add extra cream?  We used chicken stock that I made a couple weeks ago, but these could all easily be vegan by simply using vegetable stock.  I cut a couple of the recipes in half and one I cut into thirds, and there was still way more than I expected of each.  We made simple grilled cheese sandwiches on a foreman grill I forgot I had, since all the burners on the stove were being used by soup!

Here are the recipes as we made them, along with our notes on each.

Roasted Cauliflower Soup with Roasty Onions and Rosemary from The First Mess

*Various taster comments: "More manly (than the zucchini)," smoky, charred, "too roasty."
*Note: I would use less potatoes next time and not let the veggies get as browned as they did.  Maybe bigger cauliflower florets/onion chunks. 

Ingredients:

1 small head of cauliflower, cut into florets
4 medium yukon gold potatoes, diced
1 yellow onion, chopped
1 sprig of fresh rosemary
Olive oil
salt and pepper

3 cups chicken stock

1/2 of a lemon

lemon zest 

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 400F.

2. Remove the core from the cauliflower and chop it into florets.  Chop the potatoes into pieces about the same size. Chop the onion into rough 1-2 inch pieces and toss all of the veggies onto a rimmed cookie sheet or other roasting pan. 

3. Remove the leaves from the rosemary sprig and chop them up. Sprinkle the rosemary over the potatoes and cauliflower.  Toss them with olive oil, salt and pepper until evenly coated with the oil, rosemary and S&P.

4. Roast vegetables for about 20 minutes flipping and tossing them here and there with a metal spatula/spoon to promote even browning. 

5. When the vegetables are soft, remove from the oven and squeeze the 1/2 lemon over the hot vegetables (drop the lemon into the warm pan too so that it can release some oil too). Toss the vegetables with the lemon juice, scraping the browned bits off the bottom.

6. Once the vegetables are slightly cooled, put them into a soup pot and add a cup at a time of stock. Purée until smooth and cntinue blending in batches until you’ve used up everything. Heat the large soup pot full of purée over medium heat until it boils. Add more stock or water to thin the soup out if necessary and adjust seasoning to taste by adding lemon zest, more lemon juice, salt and pepper.

7.  Keep on low while you make the grilled cheese.

Zucchini Basil Soup from Cooking in Red Socks

*Various taster comments: "Tastes like summer," fresh, light.
*Note: This soup was tasty but in comparison to the rest it was just a little too simple and light. Maybe more basil or more red pepper flakes, or adding another veg to it might have been good. This soup may have benefited from a squeeze of lemon, I wish I had thought of that!  The original recipe had some cream added but I don't think that is necessary.  

Ingredients:

4 large zucchini, ends chopped off and diced

1 yellow onion, diced

3 cloves of garlic, roughly chopped

¼ tsp red pepper flakes

⅔ cup fresh basil, packed and roughly chopped

2 cups chicken stock

olive oil

salt and pepper to taste

Instructions:

1.  Heat a large soup pot over medium heat. Add a drizzle of olive oil and the zucchini, onion, garlic, and red pepper flakes. Saute for 5-7 minutes, or until the onions start to become translucent. Add the basil and cook another 3 minutes.

2. Add the chicken stock to the pot, cover, and cook for 15 minutes on a low simmer. 

3. Once the vegetables are all soft, carefully blend until the soup is completely smooth.  Add more stock if necessary (or you can add a touch of cream at this point for extra creaminess). Season to taste with salt and pepper. 

4. Keep on low heat while you make the grilled cheese. Garnish with basil.

Roasted tomato and red pepper from Vegetarian Times

*Various taster comments: "Delightful."
*Note: I was excited about this soup because I am obsessed with red peppers and we added more of them than the original recipe called for. I felt that the soup was slightly too acidic in the end and a touch of cream might be good in this one. I will try it with the leftovers!  Also the original recipe said to just half the tomatoes and quarter the peppers so they would get more browned, and I would do that next time for the slight roasty flavor and to contain the juices somewhat.
 

Ingredients:

2 ¼ lb. ripe tomatoes, diced

3 large red bell peppers, seeded and diced

1 onion, diced

4 large cloves garlic, peeled

Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

1/4 cupchopped fresh basil

1 tsp. fresh thyme leaves or ½ tsp. dried thyme

2 cups chicken stock

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400F.

2.  Place all tomatoes, peppers, onion and garlic on a large baking sheet (or two).  

3.  Toss with olive oil, sprinkle generously with salt and pepper. 

4.  Roast until brown and tender, about 20 minutes. Remove from oven; let cool slightly.

5.  Transfer vegetables and any juices to soup pot. Add basil and thyme leaves. Purée soup, gradually adding enough stock to thin soup to desired consistency.

6.  Heat through, stirring occasionally.  Keep on low while you make the grilled cheese. Serve hot. Garnish with fresh thyme.

 

Curried butternut squash and apple soup from Ina Garten

*Various taster comments: "The ginger was a great addition!" 
*Note: This soup was incredible.  I added ginger because it sounded like it would go well and V and I agreed it really made this soup extraordinary.  This one surprised us both!  

Ingredients:
1.5 lb pounds butternut squash, peeled and seeded, diced
1 yellow onion
1 red apple, peeled, cored, and diced

3 tablespoons olive oil
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 cups chicken stock
1/2 teaspoon good curry powder 

1 Tablespoon fresh grated ginger 

Scallions

Directions:
1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. 

2. Cut the butternut squash, onions and apples in 1-inch cubes. Place them on a sheet pan and toss with the olive oil, 1 teaspoon salt and 1/2 teaspoon pepper. Spread in a single layer. 

Roast for 35 to 45 minutes, until very tender.
3. When the vegetables are soft, put them into a soup pot.  Add stock 1 cup at a time and blend with immersion blender.   Add more stock as needed to reach desired consistency. 

Once blended, Add the curry powder, ginger, and salt and pepper to taste. Be sure there's enough salt and pepper to bring out the curry flavor. 

4. Keep on low until ready to serve. Top each serving with chopped scallions.

No video for this post because it was a little too chaotic!  Happy souping!