Sounds Like Soup

Which does not sound like sexy, but trust me it is.

I really like to have some soup bubbling away on the stove while I write.

There is just something homey, and comforting, and yes, sexy about it.

How many of you are cooking for yourselves?

Cooking it seems, is a bit of a lost art.

I really like to do it and wouldn’t mind it at all if I could give myself a little more time to it.  But I get by with what I do and I am happy to have some simmering away right now.

Self-care is sexy, is what I am alluding to.

Not waiting for someone else to step in and care for me.

Currently on the stove is some red lentil soup with chicken and onion, garlic and tomatoes, and carrot, salt, pepper, a smidge of chili powder, and lots of cayenne.

I am going to cook it down a little bit longer, basically as long as this blog takes to well, blog, and then pull it from the stove to cool and then “can” it up in some single serving Mason jars I have in the house.

I also made a nice pot of brown rice.

It is going to taste like a spicy dhal with chicken and I will top it with some sliced avocado, should the mood strike, or even a little yogurt.

Yum.

I noticed the trending stats on my blog tonight and thought, well, shoot, looks like it’s going to be another low reading night from the constituency.

It appears that unless I am really writing about sex or dating or men or something of that ilk, my stats drop pretty quick.

Then again, out of nowhere, there are days when suddenly they shoot way up, someone Googles my blog and the person reads through a bunch of them.

I always wonder who is so curious about my life.

Who are you, stranger?

Friend?

Foe?

Ex-lover?

Possible future friend?

Some one who wants to hang out romantically?

Come on you can tell me.

Then I will feed you some soup.

Soup is sexy, I swear by it.

I make a mean chicken soup, no more noodles though, or dumplings, since I gave up that flour stuff, but my chicken soup is still pretty damn killer.

I also make a great French red lentil with spinach and broccoli and carrots, it’s vegan and you would never freaking know, it is so good.

I once gave my manager at the bike shop a jar of it, he’s a vegan, and I have never seen some one lavish as much attention on a bowl of food.

He told me later that he had to stop himself so that he could save half of it for later.

That is nice to hear.

I make a pretty good chili, it’s Wisconsin chili and my mom’s version, pretty much, where she got it, I am assuming is from my grandparents.

She also made a fantastic chicken soup–her version with the dumplings might be my all time favorite–and an autumnal vegetable soup that always made me happy to smell and be glad for fall.

I remember working at the Essen Haus and the soups there made me squeamish to even tell a table.

“That comes with soup or salad, house or small caesar, what may I bring you?” I would ask a table.

“What kind of soup do you have tonight?”

“Our soup today is beer cheese or liver dumpling.”

The looks on people’s faces.

Priceless.

The liver dumpling was apparently really good and I had a girlfriend who swore by it when ever she was on her period, but I never did try it.

I can still see the globes of liver floating in the brown bath of broth though.

Yick.

And beer cheese?

What the fuck is beer cheese?

Actually, beer cheese is pretty spanky good.

I wouldn’t eat it today, aside from the base being beer (yeah, yeah, yeah, I know, alcohol cooks off, but you know, it would be just my luck.  Oh, did you hear?  She relapsed on beer cheese soup, said it tasted too much like the real thing and she went out for a lager which lead to an 8 ball) the base is also made with a flour roux.

But fuck me, if it’s done well, it’s extraordinary.

My boss at the Angelic, Woody, probably made the best version of it I have ever tasted.  It was creamy smooth (no lumps, and yeah, depending on the cook, there would be lumps, which is not so elegant, but hey, who is looking for elegant in beer cheese soup?) done with the Blonde Ale and sharp Wisconsin cheddar, kielbasa slices, onions, diced carrots, and bits of potato.

Jesus Lord it was good.

On a cold Wisconsin winter day, nothing better, with a couple of bread sticks to sop up the bottom of the bowl.

Amaze balls.

And yes, there was also another soup that he did well, and my God the first time I heard the name I just about barfed, but again, Woody pulled it off, Cheeseburger Soup.

Basically the same as the beer cheese soup, but with sautéed ground chuck instead of the kielbasa sausage.

It was damn skippy good.

Not soups I will be making any time soon, but they do bring back the memories.

I don’t know that I could have ever suspected the last time I had a bowl of beer cheese soup that I would ever be the type of person who would be cooking a pot of lentils on the stove, I hated lentils.

At least I hated the way my stepfather made them.

Although, come to think of it, it might be his chili recipe that I base mine off of.

No matter.

The soup, it is good, and I can smell that it is also close to being done.

As am I for the evening.

Time to wrap it up and attend to the rest of this evenings self-care needs.

Like putting up my soup for winter.

Ha.