Persimmon Pumpkin Pie Smoothie

'Tis the season everything is pumpkin flavored, even my favorite breakfast. I've been loving persimmons in my smoothies lately because of the texture and natural sweetness. Something about them just cried for pumpkin, so I went from there and came up with this winner.

Persimmon Pumpkin Pie Smoothie

Serves 2

1/2 cup plain kefir (or your favorite yogurt)

1/2 cup milk, or milk substitute (I use homemade unsweetened almond milk)
1 cup pumpkin purée
1 persimmon
1 banana
Juice of half a lemon
Small strip of lemon zest
Small hunk of fresh ginger

1 tsp pumpkin pie spice

1/2 tsp vanilla
1 tsp honey
1/2 cup – 1 cup of ice (depending on your blender and whether any of the fruit is frozen)

Blend it all together and you have sweet, tart, fresh pie in a glass! For breakfast!!!

Silky Sweet Potato Soup

Are you sick of soup, yet? Neither am I! Good thing, too, because I got a new toy. Way back in the day when my blog was a fresh little newborn, I discovered a trick that guaranteed a velvety vegetable soup. I cooked the vegetables, whipped them in the KitchenAid mixer, and then "strained" them by pressing them through a mesh sieve. It was time and work intensive. I knew the process would be greatly simplified by a ricer. Well, take a look at the America's Test Kitchen recommended tool my parents gave me as one of my holiday gifts! I couldn't wait to give it a spin and instantly had its inaugural soup in mind.

I've made simplistic sweet potato soup before - stew sweet potato chunks in milk/dairy substitute and butter/butter substitute, mash 'em up, and mix with more liquid to reach the desired consistency. Easy peasy! But I knew I could make it smoother and more delicious with a couple tweaks. The leek and turnip add richness and complexity to balance the slight sweetness. You don't need a ricer to make this soup, but if you can get your hands on one, you'll find that the texture goes beyond even velvety, all the way to silken.

Silky Sweet Potato Soup

Feel free to use milk and butter in place of my vegan non-dairy substitutions. Serves 4.

1 bulb leek, dark greens removed, diced
2 medium white/yellow sweet potatoes, peeled, halved lengthwise, and cut into half-inch slices
1 medium turnip, peeled, halved lengthwise, and cut into half-inch slices
4 Tbsp butter substitute (I like Light Smart Balance Buttery Spread)
1 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
4 cups light unsweetened soy milk, approximate

1. Spray large pot with Pam and heat to medium. Sautee leek until soft, 5-10 minutes. Add sweet potato, turnips, butter substitute, sugar, salt, and one cup of the milk. Cover and simmer over medium-low heat until potatoes fall apart with a fork, about 35-45 minutes.

2. OPTIONAL: Strain and reserve cooking liquid. Press vegetables through ricer using medium-holed plate. Discard tough fibrous parts remaining in the ricer's bowl. Add reserved cooking liquid back to the vegetables.

"Riced" sweet potato mixture.

3. Add about a cup and a half more soy milk to the vegetables. Blend using your preferred method: in the blender (may require two batches), with a hand or stand mixer, or with an immersion blender. Return to stove and slowly add more soy milk until desired consistency is reached, approximately one and half more cups. Heat over medium until hot. Salt to taste if desired. Garnish with a sprinkle of brown or turbinado sugar.

Acorn Squash Soup with Yogurt

I first got the idea for this seasonal soup from Google. No, not a Google search, a Google menu. My husband often makes everyone he knows jealous by regaling them with magical culinary tales from this mystical campus in Mountain View. One day he sent me a menu that included a creamy vegetable soup that included yogurt in its ingredients instead of cream. As cream gives me a tummy ache, I got very excited by the prospect. Once Fall and my annual autumn soup cravings came around, I decided to see if yogurt in a squash soup was a winner.

Well, it took a lot of squashes (at least I like the seeds!) and a number of batches - some that went down the drain (even a little turmeric can be too much) - but I think I've finally conquered the squash and yogurt soup. Through trial and error I learned a few things:

1. Less is more when seasoning. Also, I found that warm, sweet flavors worked better than savory herbs like thyme, rosemary, and sage.

2. Regular yogurt works better than Greek. Despite really, really wanting to use Greek yogurt, the results were tart in an off-putting way, and adding more sugar just threw off the balance of flavors. So, while Greek yogurt doesn't ruin the soup and will be fine in a pinch, regular yogurt is preferable.

3. Stir in the yogurt at the end, off heat. The instant the yogurt melts into the soup, the color softens and the texture becomes creamier - exactly the results we're looking for. Let it heat in the soup for even a short time and the yogurt separates into white specks, throwing off the color and texture. Stir the yogurt into hot soup just before serving, or divide the yogurt between bowls as a garnish and let people stir it in themselves so they can fully relish the beauty of the experience. I know that sounds cheesy, but it really is pretty.


The final result is sweet, but not cloying, and incredibly smooth and velvety while maintaining the full squash flavor instead of masking it the way cream might. I call success! So here's yet another recipe that lets you make a dish creamy without actually using any cream.

Acorn Squash Soup with Yogurt

Serves 4. This recipe halves well as a way to use squash leftover from a previous meal.

Flesh of one cooked acorn squash, about three cups
2 1/2 cups chicken or vegetable broth
2 Tbsp + 1 tsp brown sugar
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground ginger
1/4 cup plain, nonfat yogurt

In blender, puree squash with 2 cups of the broth until smooth. Remove to pot and stir in remaining half cup of broth as needed for desired consistency. Stir in sugar and spices. Heat until just hot without letting it come to a full simmer. Remove from heat and stir in yogurt until fully incorporated, or divide between four bowls and add a 1 Tbsp dollop of yogurt to each bowl, allowing your guests to stir it together themselves. Garnish with a swirl of maple syrup or a sprinkle of brown sugar.

Roasted Squash Seeds

For years and years, I've voiced remorse at dumping a handful of delicious looking seeds in the trash after cleaning out a squash, and always my sadness is met with, "Don't try it. They're not like pumpkin seeds. They won't be what you expect."

All those years everyone who said that to me were wrong! Acorn squash seeds are DELICIOUS roasted. I can't believe I just listened and didn't check for myself. All those seeds over the years, wasted. Well, never again! Throughout the fall and winter I'll try roasting the seeds of other squashes and let you know if they are equally tasty.

Roasted Squash Seeds

This recipe works great with seeds from multiple squashes for a larger batch. Just up the amount of the other ingredients - exact quantities aren't such a big deal here.

Seeds from one squash
Soy sauce and/or Worcestershire sauce
Butter
Seasonings

Preheat oven to 350. Pick the seeds from guts scooped out of one squash. Do not rinse - the slimy coating actually adds flavor. Toss with a splash of soy sauce and/or Worcestershire sauce (and other seasonings, if desired.) Spread seeds on a baking sheet sprayed with Pam. Dot with a small amount of butter, maybe 1/2 a teaspoon. Roast for 12-15 minutes, stirring every few minutes. Immediately season to taste with salt, pepper, and even cayenne - get creative! I like using popcorn salt for an even coating with less. They are best and crispiest warm, straight from the oven, but they are delicious cooled, too, though slightly tougher than pumpkin seeds. Store in an airtight container.

Another Hearty Soup

And thus continues my experiments with using V8 as a base for soup. This time just a cup gives a rich twist to a classic beef barley soup, just in time for a nasty head cold. I've been trying so many home remedies, but nothing works like homemade soup and a steaming mug of ginger tea with honey and lemon.

Again, I used vegetables I had on hand in the crisper, but this would be equally as good with peas, corn, green beans, or zucchini in any combination instead of, or along with, kale and broccoli.


Tomatoey Vegetable Beef Barley Soup

America's Test Kitchen asserts that whole sirloin tip steaks make the best beef for soup, or alternately blade or flank steak. I used very affordable chuck stew beef and it turned out terrifically. This makes a large pot of soup, enough for about 8 large servings. It could be easily halved.

1lb beef, trimmed of fat and gristle and chopped into half-inch pieces
2 Tbsp soy sauce
1 Tbsp oil
1 onion, chopped
3 carrots, chopped
4 stalks celery heart, chopped
2 large cloves garlic, pressed
2 Tbsp red wine vinegar
1 cup V8
1 can diced tomatoes, with liquid 
3 packed cups kale, prepared*
2 cups small broccoli florets
4 1/2 cups beef broth
1 1/2 cups chicken broth
1 bay leaf
1 cup barley


Marinate beef in soy sauce for 15 minutes. Heat oil in large Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Saute onion, carrots, and celery for 5 minutes or until onion starts to turn translucent. Remove vegetables to a bowl. Add beef, with marinade, to pot and brown, stirring often, for 6 minutes. Add garlic and saute 30 seconds. Add red wine vinegar plus 1 Tbs of the V8 and cook for another minute or two, stirring constantly. Combine all ingredients in pot and bring to a boil. Cover and reduce heat to a strong simmer. Simmer for 45 minutes or until barley is soft and vegetables are tender. 


As with most soups, this is great leftover after all the flavors have had time to meld. The barley will continue to soak up moisture overnight and get puffier, which makes it even better. Keep extra beef broth on hand to add to leftovers to replace lost liquid. 


*To prep a head of kale, remove and discard the toughest stems and ribs and coarsely chop remaining leaves into bite-sized pieces.

Harvest Tomato Soup

I have been CRAVING autumn vegetable soups like CRAZY, but San Francisco's Indian Summer weather has just not been cooperating. Temps in the 80s put a damper on hovering over the stove or crock-pot or roasting vegetables in the oven. We'll occasionally get a break in the heat, just enough to get my hopes up and start planning a grocery list, but every time it turns out it's just teasing me. Well, yesterday did not get nearly as hot as forecasted, and it even cooled off after the sun went down, so I decided to wait no longer and pounced, making a quick, simple vegetable soup to take advantage of this window of opportunity, however brief. I dare to hope that Fall is really here, because now my head is swimming with all the soups I want to make and I don't want to stop now I've started.

I took the inspiration for this soup from the nerdiest of places, which makes me even happier about it. Wil Wheaton of Star Trek and Internet fame recently posted the recipe for a soup he made to combat a nasty case of sinusitis. It fit all the qualifications I desired for last night's meal: quick, full of whatever vegetables looked good in the market and that I had in the crisper, and with something different from my usual recipes to inspire me. The difference that caught my eye: he used tomato juice as the base. Of course I tweaked the recipe and made it my own, and I encourage you to do the same. This soup can be extremely versatile. I already have big plans for other ways I can use V8 (which I used instead of tomato juice for added flavor and nutrition) to pump up other soups.

The husband man said it was probably the healthiest thing he's eaten in 5 years, yet he still enjoyed it. Of course, he said it would be better with barley (his response to any barley-less soup) and pork (his response to any porkless dish of any sort). I do think some ham, pancetta, or bacon would be great in this, but I was in the mood for a veggie-only soup. I also have an idea brewing for a slightly less tomatoey beef barley version I'm sure will please him. Big plans, my friends, big plans.


Harvest Tomato Soup

Wil's version was completely vegan. Omit broth and replace with water or vegetable broth to take it back to vegan status. Serves 4 as an entree, 6 as a starter.

1 Tbsp oil
1 med onion, chopped
4 stalks celery hearts, chopped
3 carrots, chopped
2 large cloves garlic, pressed
2 cups small broccoli florets
2 cobs corn, kernels removed
3 packed cups prepared* kale
1 can tomatoes, with liquid
1 can kidney beans, with liquid
3 cups V8
2 cups chicken broth
1 Tbsp soy sauce
1 bay leaf
1/2 tsp. dried thyme

In a large soup pot, heat oil over medium-high heat. Saute onions, celery, and carrots for 4 minutes. Add garlic and saute another minute. Add remaining ingredients and stir well to combine. 

Bring to a boil. Reduce to a strong simmer and cover. Simmer for 30 minutes or until all the vegetables are tender. 

*To prep a head of kale, remove and discard the toughest stems and ribs and coarsely chop remaining leaves into bite-sized pieces.