Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Pepperland


Mumbai weather has been unusually kind to us city folk.

When your bare feet hit the floor in the morning, they are icy cold. The blanket has become a life support of sorts. And of course, jackets and hoodies are making their appearances after being stuffed at the back of the wardrobe for months.
I feel the 2007 winter rushing back all over again.

The only thing that can make you enjoy this winter better is that mug of coffee. And if you crave some umami, you better reach for that reassuring bowl of Onion and Cheddar cheese soup.

Apparatus required

2- 3 tablespoons of butter, 2 medium sized chopped onions, a clove of grated garlic, a bit of flour, chicken/vegetable stock, milk and cheese (Cheddar preferred).

Procedure

It's simple as hell really.
You heat up the pan. Add the butter, watch it melt furiously. Dump in the onions, and saute them. Here, you are recommended to stop for a second and just smell the brilliance of butter and onions.

Once the onions become a bit translucent, add a bit of grated garlic. Then, shake it up baby now, shake it up baby. Twist and SHOUT! Twist and shout! C'mon c'mon c'mon c'mon baby now, c'mon baby. C'mon and work it on out, work it on out!

Ok, sorry. I think I lost track there somehow. *mutters**stupidbeatlesplaylist*
Coming back, add the tiniest amount of flour to this mixture. Maybe a tablespoon or so. Any flour will do. (Even if you don't, I doubt the Earth will blow up) You see that this soaks up all the butter. It's the funniest thing. Anyway, just plop in the stock at this point ( It depends on the amount of soup you'd want to make) and cover it with a lid for a good 5-7 minutes.

Once you take of the lid, the most gorgeous smell will hit you. Don't panic. Such levels of awesomeness in food, do occur.
Add salt, and pepper. Taste it.
(Don't you love the fact that you get to keep tasting the food at stages to "check the flavours"? Who cares if it brings down the final amount to half the originally intended amount!)

Stir it up. And finally, add milk. Not a lot, maybe half the amount of stalk you added. If you have an urge to be extra unhealthy, and desperately want to make you jeans feel tight at all places, add cream as well. Two minutes more on the stove, then tip it over in your bowl and you're done.


Refrain from slurping still. You need to add the final crumble of cheese (Cheddar preferred. It's not too salty, and just perfect), and another dash of pepper.

And there it is, winter bliss in a bowl.




The first slurp, will be these thick creamy taste hitting you like a truck. You can taste the sinful butter, the chicken stock, the slight sweetness of the milk, and the most amazing little tiny kick of that garlic.

It's unbelievable how thick and delicious this soup is.




And the melting piece of cheese crumbles on the top just add another dimension to it.




Good ol' toasted bread goes perfect with this. Garlic bread, even more so :)


So do yourself a favour, and make this steaming reassuring bowl of soup already.
You know you want to.

1 Comments (+add yours?)

Preeti Ramaraj said...

Im singing twist and shout now :P

And oh, I must get back to cooking once these darn exams are done..All I've been able to do now is make boring food interesting ..I need to start whipping up something new

Ok, talking abt the soup..colour beautiful and I can almost smell the cheese and milk and onion, some pepper would be perfect for the winter!!