Vegetable Soup With Any Root - NYTimes.com

What?s for dinner?

It?s a universal question, whether you?re a professional cook, a passionate amateur or someone with enough interest to want to avoid ordering takeout every night. I?ll give you the answer here on Diner?s Journal every other Monday (alternating with another new recipe feature, Restaurant Takeaway).

What you?ll find: recipes for dishes that I like to make for weeknight dinners, a mix of tried-and-true cornerstones of my repertory and fly-by-night experiments that happen to work out well (we?re not going to talk about the ones that don?t).

What you won?t find: anything complex that uses too many pans (who wants to wash them all?) or calls for exotic ingredients that you can?t pick up at your local market on the way home. And while the recipes are not always going to be under-30-minutes fast, all are fast enough to get you fed by a reasonable hour.

One thing to note is that while not all of the recipes will be broadly child-friendly ? and this depends a great deal upon your child ? most of them can be adapted in some way to feed the whole family. I have a great fondness for anchovies, horseradish and chiles. My 4-year-old does not. But with a few modifications, we manage just fine.

This week?s recipe, for a hearty, pur?ed root vegetable soup, is something we eat at home at least twice a month. We vary the roots, change out the herbs or add spices, but the technique is always the same. Saut? alliums, celery and herbs in plenty of butter or oil, add roots, salt and water, and let cook until everything is soft enough to gum. Pur?e the mess and season liberally with lemon juice, olive oil, more salt and chile flakes or grated cheese. The soup itself is quiet and gentle and needs the seasonings to really sing, so don?t be shy.

Here?s a tip: The larger you cut your roots, the longer they will take to cook, but the quicker they are to prepare for the pot. If you cut your roots into very small pieces, they will cook quickly but take you longer to prep at the front end. So it?s up to you how you want to spend your time. I think hands-off simmering is preferable to protracted chopping, but maybe you?re better with a chef?s knife than I am. I usually cut the roots into large chunks and let them bubble away for 30 to 40 minutes while I get the child bathed, the salad made and the wine poured. But one day, when I?m really hungry, I plan to use the food processor to instantly grate all the roots and see if I can cut the cooking time in half. In the meantime, soup?s on.

Ingredients

• 6 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 1 large onion or 2 leeks (white and light green part only), chopped
• 2 to 3 celery stalks, diced
• 3 garlic cloves, finely chopped
• 3 rosemary or thyme branches
• 2 bay leaves
• 3 1/2 pounds mixed root vegetables (carrot, parsnip, celery root, turnip, rutabaga, sweet or regular potato), peeled and cut into 1-inch chunks
• 2 teaspoons fine sea salt, more as needed
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper, more as needed
• Juice of 1/2 lemon, more for serving
• Extra-virgin olive oil
• Flaky sea salt
• Crushed Aleppo, Urfa or other chile flakes, optional
• Grated Parmesan or pecorino, optional

Method

• 1. Melt butter in a large, heavy-bottomed pot. Stir in onion and celery. Cook, stirring occasionally, until vegetables are tender, about 10 minutes. Stir in garlic, rosemary and bay leaves; cook 1 minute more. Add root vegetables, 8 cups water, salt and pepper. Bring to a boil; reduce heat to medium and simmer, covered, until vegetables are tender, 30 to 40 minutes.
• 2. Remove and discard rosemary branches and bay leaves. Using an immersion blender, pur?e soup until smooth. (Alternatively, you can pur?e the soup in batches in a blender or food processor.) If the soup is too thick, add a little water. Season with lemon juice and more salt to taste.
• 3. To serve, ladle soup into bowls and top with a drizzle of olive oil, a few drops of lemon juice, flaky salt and crushed chile or grated cheese, if desired.

Source: The New York Times

Source: http://dinersjournal.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/03/11/vegetable-soup-with-any-root/

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