"Meatless" May, day one

Turns out that I'm a total a-hole! Remember how I was all like, "it's not like we have a chest freezer full of beef" or whatever? Yeah, I inventoried one freezer and came up with 16 meat items. And one of those items was a bag of eight salmon fillets. There is enough meat in this house for us to eat meat three meals a day, all month. Which begs the question, what the hell have I been doing spending a hundred dollars at the grocery store every week? I guess the only explanation is that I am actually a food hoarder. Well, and maybe a little bit that I suck at meal planning and often go running out to the store for the chicken I didn't defrost the night before.

Since I'm so meat rich, the plan has morphed again slightly. Now it is more of a "clean out the freezer and the pantry" sort of event. I'm aiming for bare cupboards and desolate arctic tundra in the freezers. It's the same spirit as the meatless thing, though - I am trying to be more aware of what we're eating and where it comes from, and I am reducing our carbon footprint by not requiring as much new food be generated. It just seems silly to call it "meatless" when we're probably going to end up eating more meat than we would usually.

I did go ahead and make a meatless dinner for night one of my so-called Meatless May. Nothing exotic, nothing that will convert the masses to vegetarianism, but it did use up things that needed using.

Food photography is not my forte

There you have it. Broccoli cheddar soup, adapted from this recipe from Eating Well magazine. I thickened it with a can of navy beans that had been in my cupboard for probably three years instead of a potato, which I would have had to buy.  It wasn't exactly sexy, but it got the job done. The bread was a Boudin bakery sourdough boule that Husband brought home from one of his trips to San Francisco, but not the last one or the one before that I don't think. Regardless of how long it had been in the freezer, it made an excellent butter delivery system.

Split pea thoughts for next time

1. Try not to include little hambones easily mistaken for potato chunks.

2. Use a waxy variety potato next time; Russet turned a skosh mealy.

3. Add a chopped carrot along with said waxy potato, post blender.

4. Take Cook's Illustrated's advice and use ham steak instead of ham hock - I don't really enjoy the scent of bone in my soup. Plus some of the meat that comes off a hock is pretty nasty.

Here is the recipe for my concoction. I just had some for lunch with a 1/2 a grilled cheese, and you should, too.

Split Pea Soup a la Porkchop
adapted from several sources

1 C chopped onion
1/2 C chopped carrot
1/2 C chopped celery
2 T butter
1.5 LB smoked ham hock
1.5 C split peas, rinsed and checked for rocks
2 t dried marjoram (or 1 t thyme and 1 t oregano)
1 bay leaf
8 C water
1 chunked up potato
1 chunked up carrot
1/2 C leftover mashed potatoes (optional)
salt and pepper

In a large enough soup pot, melt the butter over medium heat. Add the chopped veg and sweat until soft,maybe 10 minutes. Add the ham hock, peas and herbs and stir. After a minute or so, cover with the water. Bring to a boil and simmer, stirring occasionally, until the ham is falling off the bone and the peas are mushy. A little over an hour, in my case.

Remove the ham to a cutting board and find the stupid bay leaf - remove it, too. Take half of the soup and either blend in batches in the blender or use a hand blender to puree until bright green and smooth. Return to pot with the unblended half. Add your chunked up veg and the mashed potatoes (if using) and continue to simmer until the potatoes are cooked through. In the meantime salvage what ham you can off the hock and return it to the pot as well. Taste and season with S&P.

I would recommend making this the day before you actually want to eat it - it tastes best if you refrigerate it overnight and reheat it the next day. Makes about 10 cups of soup.