A New Way To Use Mint - Greek Lentil Soup : The Essential New York Times Cookbook

My trusty mini sow cooker

I bought this mini slow cooker for myself about six months back so I could cook oats overnight. I’ve cooked oats maybe once, but that’s only because I’ve found so many other uses for it. It came in really handy last week for Craig Clairborne’s 1977 recipe for Greek Lentil Soup.

I picked this one out of many that sounded good because it helped use up some of my flourishing mint plants from the back yard. I’ve never had mint in soup before, and I have to say it was nice. The fact that this was a vegetarian soup was a big plus too since my daughter is vegetarian, and I am halfway there. This would have been good with some crusty bread, but it was also fine with some cornbread from a box mix.

There were a bunch more good looking soup recipes I want to try, but it’s time to move on to salads.

Note: This recipe is part of a long look at Amanda Hesser’s 2010 The Essential New York Times Cookbook. See all posts here. Links to amazon.com are affiliate links. Thanks for your support!

Carefully Constructed Soup: The Essential New York Times Cookbook

Garden Minestrone from 1973 was the most fun soup to cook ever. You start by layering a huge pot full of tomatoes, zucchini, romaine lettuce (!), peas, beans, and herbs, and then browning the whole thing. Only then do you stir and it magically becomes a delicious stew. No broth added!

The recipe called for the whole thing to be done in a glass casserole dish so you can dump it out later, but I did it in my crockpot. The presentation sounds amazing, but it was a weeknight and we had 30 minutes to eat then get to 4 different places. I served this over polenta with chicken sausages just to bulk it up a little, but I would have been completely happy with just the veggies.

Note: This recipe is part of a long look at Amanda Hesser’s 2010 The Essential New York Times Cookbook. See all posts here. Links to amazon.com are affiliate links. Thanks for your support!

It's Soup Week! The Essential New York Times Cookbook

I had some terrible not-covid bug last week that had me not feeling like cooking at all. But now I’m back among the living recovering and what a great time to start soup week. Actually, it will be soup weeks because I’m behind so I’ll be cooking soup the rest of this week into the next. What great timing!

I’m excited for this chapter. Soup is my favorite meal since the days when my mom used to make me non stop Lipton cups of noodles. Hesser says soups have changed the most in 100 years, and I’m wondering if they’ve changed even more since 2010. I guess I’ll have to shell out for the updated cookbook if I want to know.

Some soups looked great but I had to take them off the list because there was just too much cream involved, but there were quite a few that I can’t wait to make. Soup week!

Note: This recipe is part of a long look at Amanda Hesser’s 2010 The Essential New York Times Cookbook. See all posts here. Links to amazon.com are affiliate links. Thanks for your support!