hot and sour soup Archives - Mamma's Cooking

One pot meals

My husband is always happy when I make a one pot meal. He is the one who does the dishes 🙂 A one pot meal can be anything from soup to chili to pot roast to pasta. Fewer dishes means less time in the kitchen and more time for the many other tasks you have to accomplish or maybe (gasp!) even give you 5 minutes to take some time for yourself.

One of the favorite one pot meals in my house is my Hot and Sour Soup.

It only takes about 20 minutes to prepare and is the recipe I chose to display when asked to be one of the featured blogs on Wayfair.com’s Stock, Soup and Multi-Pots page. Check it out!

If you don’t like hot and sour soup, try my French Onion, Butternut Squash, Sweet Potato Coconut Curry, Potato Leek or Carrot Ginger soup. One pot can also make amazing chicken stock or healing chicken noodle soup.

Another flavorful meal you can create in a snap, is my One Pan Roasted Chicken.

Serve it with some zoodles and you have a tasty spring-like meal!

Chili is a one pot meal that can either be made in your slow cooker or in one pot on the stove. My Crowd Pleasing Quinoa Pumpkin Chili can easily be made, simmering on the stove in 2 to 3 hours.

Quinoa risotto is a decadent and healthy one pot meal for dinner one night on its own or you can serve it with some leftover chicken or steak.

One pot meals are versatile and easy. Try one of my recipes above! Let me know how it turns out. Let me know if there are other recipes you want to see.

Sweet Potato Coconut Curry Soup and my favorite soups from 2016

Soup is warm and comforting especially on crazy cold, rainy/snowy and windy days like we seem to be having here south of Boston. Coming in from shoveling, walking the dog or just your hectic day, having a bowl of soup is a great way to slow your day down and unwind for even 5 minutes, while you enjoy it.

Here is a great recipe for one of my favorite soups which happens to also be naturally vegan and gluten-free.

Sweet Potato Coconut Curry Soup

Ingredients

½ of a large sweet onion, thinly sliced (about 2 cups)

2 cloves of garlic, minced

1 Tablespoon of olive oil

2 medium Yukon gold potatoes, peeled and diced (about 2 cups)

3 medium sweet potatoes, peeled and diced (about 6 cups)

2 Tablespoons fresh grated ginger

3 cups vegetable OR chicken stock

13.5 oz can coconut milk

1 teaspoon salt

1/8 teaspoon black pepper

Directions

Cook onions and garlic in the olive oil over medium heat, until tender. Pour into your crock pot and put the crock pot on high. Add the potatoes, sweet potatoes, ginger and stock. Cook on high for about 4 hours. Once all the potatoes are tender, puree the soup, either with an immersion blender or allowing to cool and then carefully pour into your blender or food processor. Puree until smooth. Add the coconut milk, salt and pepper. Cook for another 30 minutes in crock pot and then serve.

Here are my other favorite soups from 2016:

Butternut Squash Soup

Potato Leek Soup

Hot and Sour Soup to Warm your Soul

Chicken Noodle Soup

Any of these would be a great addition to your New Years feast! I am making French Onion soup 🙂 Recipe will follow in 2017!

Hot and Sour Soup to Warm your Soul

This is one of my favorite soups of all time! It is warm, comforting and absolutely delicious! I could eat this every day, especially now that the weather is cold. I was turned onto hot and sour soup when one of our local take out places brought me a free one. Their ploy worked! I was immediately hooked and had to add it to our order each time. To make it more cost effective I had to figure out how to make it at home. I looked at various recipes online but couldn’t find one that replicated that comforting flavor, so I played with it on my own and this is what I came up with! Enjoy!

Hot and Sour Soup

Ingredients

2 Tablespoons of vegetable oil

¼ teaspoon of sesame oil

About ½ pound of shiitake mushrooms, diced

2 cloves of garlic, minced

¼ teaspoon chili paste (I use Gourmet Garden)

Pinch of white pepper (add more if you want it to be spicy, careful though a little goes a long way)

1/3 cup soy sauce (make sure it is gluten free, if making this GF. I use La Choy Low sodium)

1/3 cup rice vinegar

2 cups beef stock

2 cups chicken stock (or you can use all vegetable stock or all beef or all chicken, it tested best with the mixture )

3 Tablespoons corn starch

3 Tablespoons water

1 egg, beaten

7 ounces (about half of a package) of extra firm tofu, diced

3 green onions, sliced

Directions

In a large soup pot over med-high, heat the vegetable oil and sesame oil. Add the mushrooms, garlic, chili paste, white pepper and stir. Cook for a couple of minutes, until fragrant then add soy and vinegar, stir and allow to simmer for 3 to 4 minutes. Add stock and simmer for another 5 to 6 minutes. In a small bowl combine corn starch and water then pour into the soup and stir. Cook for another couple of minutes and add beaten egg while stirring. Add tofu and green onions. Stir and then serve!

Note: This is a mild version, not very spicy. Add more chili paste and/or white pepper if you want more heat. Careful with the white pepper!

The first time I made this, I made a batch every week. I could not get enough! And I don’t even like mushrooms or tofu 😉 This is a healthy and satisfying meal that is gluten-free and can easily be made vegetarian or even vegan!

It is the perfect snack or meal to have on hand for family arriving for the holidays. I know I would want some after being on an airplane or in a car all day.

Take some time out of your hectic schedule this weekend and make some soup. Eat it in front of the fire. Realistically you might make it at 10 pm, after the kids are asleep, then eat it standing in the kitchen or hopefully in bed binge watching Netflix. Still, you should try. More soups to come each Friday! Here are the links to some past soups in case your in the mood for something else. (Just remember that if the post is before April 2014 it might need to be adapted to be gluten free – contact me! I can help)