I don’t know about you, but we eat soup all year long. Yes, even in the Summer. There is something about soup that is so comforting to me, and I am glad to say that my family feels the same way. Sundays are like a Sabbath for me. No, as a Christian I am not under the Mosaic Law, Christ nailed that to the torture stake. The Mosaic law gives us insight into how God feels about certain things. Having a day of rest is one of those.
On Sundays I don’t cook. I don’t clean. We do the bare minimum to care for our animals and that is it. We spend that day with family, family worship and the like. But we still need to eat.
That’s where soup comes in. Most Sundays it’s usually soups, roast, or just plain leftovers. I find this so liberating and restful. It takes some planning and forethought as to what you want to eat on that day, but it is worth it.
Soup is my number one go-to move because you can put it in the crock pot, Instapot, or just on the stovetop with a low setting and people can eat at their leisure. That is what we do on Sundays. We either use paper plates or bowls, or just rinse out the bowls we use and reuse them, however, because it’s a Sabbath Day I try to avoid that too.
So now that you know the back story, let’s make some soup shall we?
INGREDIENTS:
3 large stalks of celery, diced
2 lb of potatoes, diced
5 cloves of garlic
6 c of chicken stock
1 qt of cream
1 large onion, diced
1 lb of bacon, diced
20 oz of clams (with clam juice from the can included in measurement)
½ c of flour
1 pat of butter
DIRECTIONS:
In a pan, fry the diced bacon until cooked thoroughly. Separate the bacon from the bacon grease, and reserve both for later use.
In the stock pot heat your pat of butter and ¼ cup of bacon grease on a medium heat.
Next, place your diced onions and celery into the pot, and cook until the onions are translucent.
Once translucent, place your diced garlic in and allow it to cook for one minute.
Next, add ½ cup of flour, and start stirring vigorously. Cook the flour until it’s a light brown. Do not stop stirring. Everything in the pot will clump up, and that’s ok.
Next, slowly add the chicken stock while continuing to stir. Once you have added all the chicken stock it should become a thickened sauce, better known as a rue.
Then add the potatoes, diced bacon and the juice from the canned clams, and cook for 20 minutes, or until the potatoes are done.
Lastly, add your clams and cream, stir slowly, and allow to cook on low heat for 10 minutes.
Then turn off the heat and serve.
POINTS AND ADVICE:
This is a recipe that requires you to have everything diced and prepped (mise en place) prior to cooking.
Bacon grease: You don’t need to use the bacon grease if you don’t want to, but it certainly enhances the flavor.
Salt: You will notice in this recipe I don’t use salt. There is plenty of salt in the clams and bacon grease, its not necessary to add it, but certainly salt to taste. My suggestion is to add it at the table, and not while cooking.