Luxurious Cabbage Soup | Kitchen Recipe | The Key Ingredient | PBS North Carolina

[Music] we're making a luxurious cabbage soup with a side of crunchy really good cheese toast [Music] you know sometimes sitting down to a bowl of homemade soup feels like having a meal with one of your best friends it's comforting it's there when you need it we're going to make a luxurious but simple cabbage soup today and serve it with a side of really good cheese toast it's going to be one of your new comforts i promise so the secret to any great pot of soup is to build flavor at each stage it's not tedious but it's thoughtful the first thing i'm going to do for this great cabbage vegetable soup is i'm going to soften up what is called a mirepoix all that means is finely chopped carrot and onion and fennel in this case instead of celery we want this just short of a paste because they're going to dissolve in the liquid and make this great flavorful base now when you're softening vegetables it's a great idea to always add a big healthy pinch of salt salt makes the vegetables release their own delicious juices and they'll get tender and release lots of flavor salt is a magic first step now once this gets a good sizzle going on it what i'm actually going to do is put on the lid on the pot and let some steam build up in there that will further soften these vegetables and encourage them to release their flavor all in all it's going to take about five minutes so it's been about five six minutes and what i have now is these vegetables have become very tender they've not dissolved but they've almost turned into a sauce and now it's time for my tomato paste this is a trick i learned years ago is a great thing to do when you're sauteing vegetables clear a little spot in the middle of the pot and then add some tomato paste now this is going to give some flavor but what this tomato paste is really doing is adding believe it or not some sweetness to these vegetables and when you stir it in and get it against the bottom of the hot pot it is quickly caramelizing and it's going to add a tremendous amount of flavor to the base of this soup it's a great trick you can do this with other soup recipes as well so when it's really well coated and you can hear the sizzle it's time to put in the stock now you can easily keep this soup vegetable only and use a good high quality vegetable stock or you can use chicken stock whatever you have on hand and give it a good stir if there are any little bits of your vegetable mixture on the bottom of the pot you're going to want to loosen these and now it is time for our friend cabbage the star of this show now today i'm using a savoy cabbage the one that has the wrinkly leaves but any kind of cabbage is going to work a familiar green cabbage you can even use napa cabbage but i don't think that red cabbage is a great option for this recipe it's going to turn your soup kind of a ruddy color that's going to be hard to explain this is shredded we're going to add it in handfuls and it's going to look like it's too much but as this cabbage cooks it shrinks down a little bit and you're going to find the amount is just right now before i put on the lid let me tell you another secret weapon when it comes to flavor i have parmesan cheese rinds what is that if you've ever seen a big wheel of parmesan in the store you'll know that the outer edge is really hard it's too hard to grate up or to eat but there is still flavor in here and we're going to drop these cheese rinds into the broth it's like a cheese soup bone it's meatless but it's going to add salt and flavor and richness and umami and these things cost almost nothing they're in the grocery store they're a wonderful addition a surprise flavor in a pot of vegetable soup chunk them right down in there put your lid back on leaving it a jar just a little bit and we're going to simmer this until the cabbage is tender there's a sweet spot in there you don't want it crunchy you don't want it too soft when it's almost like al dente pasta the cabbage is perfect and then we'll move on to our final stage you know maybe the only thing better than a hunk of bread with a bowl of soup is some really good cheese toast and this is good cheese toast is simple but there are a couple of tricks that will make yours better than ever what i've done is while my soup is simmering i have toasted the bread just put a little butter on it and a little salt and pepper and pop it in the oven until it starts to be good and toasty and now i'm going to mix together my topping for it i have here a mixture of coarsely shredded cheeses you can use cheddar gouda some parmesan whatever cheese you have on hand and i'm gonna add a little bit of mayonnaise and a little bit of good crunchy mustard and stir this together just enough to help the cheese stick together a little bit so once that is good and mixed and moist you want to put it on top of your bread you know what your fingers are probably the best way to do this so you don't have to spread it out too much because the heat of the oven is going to help with that but you want to make a little mound pretty much an equal amount on each kind of bread you can use one kind of bread or a mixture something that'll be good and crunchy and hold up to all this cheesy goodness at this point you have a choice you can go ahead and toast it or it's happy just hanging out on the tray like this until you finish your soup and then while everybody is ladling into their bowls stick this under the broiler until it's brown and bubbly you've got really good cheese toast so it's been about 20 minutes my cabbage is just on the edge of tender and we're going to add the next great ingredient which happens to be beans cabbage and beans are a wonderful classic combination and i'm using some cooked white beans now you can cook these from scratch or you can use canned beans either one is going to be just fine if you use canned beans you want to drain them but not rinse them i'm also going to add in some fresh thyme we're going to start building up the herbs in this soup now like i said cabbage and beans are a match made in heaven but what if you don't have any beans you can put something else in here you could put pasta even little raviolis rice it's your soup gotta do what makes sense to you so now our soup is ready to go to the table just a couple of more little bits of flavor right at the very end the first thing i'm gonna add is some fresh basil the warmth of the soup is going to release the aroma and give this wonderful burst of flavor i'm also going to add a good pinch of crushed red pepper flakes you can do this to taste some people are going to want a lot some people are going to want just a little you can also serve these at the table and let each person doctor their own bowl if you want to and last but far from least is a little bit of good vinegar vinegar is a soup's pal it's their secret weapon the trick is to add just a little splash just enough to perk up the flavors without making it taste sour or vinegary and there you have it a wonderful pot of aromatic delicious comforting sophisticated cabbage soup this will hold in your refrigerator very well for two or three days and warm it up and each time you do give it a little taste it might need a little salt it might need a little pepper this soup hits the spot you know when you have a pot of soup and you are in the mood for soup there may be no more satisfying meal this one is full of flavor and aromatic goodness and rich broth it is so delicious yet surprisingly simple and we made a rockin crispy cheese toast i'm going in this is a keeper you're gonna love this i can't wait for you to make it [Music] it's ready yes it's ready so just let it all begin when i was a little girl i remember seeing farmers and gardeners planting rows of those little leafy cabbage seedlings and then waiting for those big round cabbages to rise up out of the ground cabbage has almost a magical role in some children's story books when i was a little girl i remember hearing people say that new babies were found under cabbage leaves and i thought that that was a fine start for us all figuring out how to use this bounty of cabbage well to me that's just plain fun

Channel: PBS North Carolina

Views: 46,424

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Id: 4bMGVlYDmMo

Length: 9min 50sec (590 seconds)

Published: Tue Nov 02 2021