Spring Soups A Lighter Flavor

 Even though the weather is becoming warmer there's still a need for homemade soup. Yet Spring soups are not only easy to make but light.They're also burst with fresh green flavor, perfect for welcoming a season of growth and renewel.

MInestrone is the obvious choice for a Spring potage.It's a vegetable soup that's full of garden goodness. For Spring swap out the heavy beans and pasta for Spring greens, kale and asparagus. If you want some protein add chickpeas but the soup can taste just as good without them.Also add in a couple of fresh garlic stalks which should be growing depending on where you live. Two Spring staples - peas and artichokes are added.Dandelions are starting to show right now. You can add these although they can sometimes have a bitter taste.Be prudent with them.If you want to add artichoke hearts you can. Remember to keep the bones of the soup.A good broth whether chicken or vegetable and a can of diced tomatoes. For the last try the fire roasted ones for some complexity. sprinkle of grated Parmesan will finish it off before serving. Since this is a vegetable soup, you can nix the side serving of salad. Crusty French bread with butter is good with it or even the extra thin bread sticks - grissini from Torino.

Surprisingly enough onion soup can be tailored to fit the Spring. Instead of regular onions try verdant scallions enhanced with the addition of soy sauce. Potatoes give the soup it's creaminess. You can use water as a base for a lighter flavor or vegetable broth for a more flavorful one. The onions and potatoes are sauteed first in olive oil with a bit of butter or butter substitute. The broth or water is then added in a long with the soy sauce.Oregano is added for more flavor if you want to. Everything is them simmered for a few minutes and can be blended with an immersion blender or poured into a traditional one. Another warm weather idea is foraging for your soup's ingredients. You can easily make a dandelion leaf one or one that is rich with nettles. Dandelion is good paired with spinach so you can add some leaves to the broth . Carrots give this all green potage bright pops of color and some sweetness too.Nettles taste like spinach  but with a peppery aftertaste. Again , these can be combined with spinach and cooked in a vegetable broth for a refreshing soup.

It's Spring yet don't put away that stockpot! You can create tasty light bowls of a flavorful soup. Try them for a light Spring supper.

An Eclipse With Oreos

 If you cou;dn't see today's solar eclipse, then take a look ar this Oreo eclipse.It's sort of the same but the Oreo is tastier. 

I;ve just discovered their Java Chip ones These are pretty good and have a cappuccino flavor. Although my favorite cookie is Lidly's Sondey ones. Theirs is the most flavorful without being overwhelmingly sweet.

 

Watch the videos below .Make your own eclipse with your favorite sandwich cookie>Do you like the Traditonal Oreo?Or Lidl's Double Stuffed Ones? Let us know.

https://youtu.be/ZpHTgMtgXsQ?si=h8G78MfAguaJ1SkI

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Wendy's Creamsicle Is it A Dreamsicle

 Wendy's has brought back this Creamsicle Forsty for a short while, replacing its' famed vanilla Frosty. Is it just has tasty as a real Creamsicle, a mix of orange and vanilla ice cream?Is it just tasty as the chocolate Frosty?

I had to try it to see. To be honest I 'm not a big Creamsicle fan but I do like a good orange sherbet.However  was reminiscent of baby aspirin.It was a little too sweet. There was the citrus and vanilla flavor but it was overpowered by a sugary sweetness.There could be one solution to cut this - freezing it.

I put it in the fridge for two hours .It did have a nice ice cream consistency , but the flavor was still the same. Freezing it didn't cut the sugariness.I think for it to work is if Wendy's' added unsweetened orange juice to this. The juice's tartness would work equally well with vanilla ice cream. It's something for them to consider.

Is the Frosty Creamsicle worth it.? If you;re a big fan of Frosty's, yes. If not try Wendy's Frosty's sodas. These are cool and refreshing without a lot of sweetness.

An EAsy Spring Party

 What works for a Spring party? Light dishes that are still tasty and filling.They could be seafood or a salad? It could lead off withh chicken.Any would make a memorable presentation.

First time contributor  and cookbook author Kidey Heuck gave three interesting dishes in wednesday's New York Times Food section. To start off the season you could easily make her littlemech clams with cherry tomatoes.They're served over peark couscous for a light take on the upcoming seafood season, She recommends chopping the tomatoes ahead of time. The littlemeck clams are first soaked as the tomatoes are cooked with dry white wine and red Chiles. This makes for a spicy sauce that would go well with crusty bread for dipping. It should be served with a simple green salad as Ms Heuck suggests. You could also experiment with grape tomatoes too for a sweetr taste.If your guest prefer chicken then try her whole milk yogurt with sharma spices such as ginger, turmeric and allspice along with cinnamon, coridandr and cumin. Roast veggies work great here.

The third dish is a taverna salad. This sia perfect dish for vegan and vegetarian guests. CHickpeas provide the protein . Tomatoes, yellow peppers, and English cucumber give it color and flavor while Kalamara olives and chopped red onion provide the taverna flavor.Parsley and shallots are chopped and added too. It's topped with toasted pita and halloumi cheese. This is a Cypriot based cheese often used in many Greek dishes. THese are slightly toasted and then cut into  two to three inch cubes and tiossed into the salad. A variation on this is serving it with stuffed grape leaves or subbing in feta cheese for the halloumi. Remember to get good Greek olive oil for this. It has a much  richer flavor than Italian olive oiil. Ouzo would work with this as well. Serve with more pita and tahini dip if you want. This is also a good salad to make ahead , especially for Spring barbecues.

These three dishes are perfect for Spting dinners. Make them and enjoy their rich flavor. They're full of spices and herbs, which bring a warm weather freshness to them

Easter Leftovers

 Here's the question of the week - what is your favorite Easter leftover ?

Is it the ham that' ground into a deviled pate? Those Cadbury mini eggs baked into cookies? Or asparagus turned into salad?. 

Let us,know and provide recipes if you want.

Plastic's Tight Grip

 Like it or not plastic has a tight grip on how America eats. Without it  our produce along with meats and fish could go bad. We can get sick.Yet our addiction to plastic is deadly. IS there a happy medium for the future?

Regular contributor Kim Severson wrote about this very real problem in today's New York Times Food Wednesday Food section. The US alone [roduces the most with forty percent of it being plastic. The country also has a problem with food waste too. yet one cucumber rotting in a land fill is not as bad as plastic. Yet plasric helps in reducing food waste. Americans have a bad habit of buying too much and not eating or using what they buyThe average American family spends $1500 on produce yearly Not that much is eaten and it's thrown out.The Biden Administration is trying to reduce this. There is already a draft to create a strategy by 2030. Plastic has been protecting produce since th 1930's - for ninety years!It started with cellophane wrapping vegetables and fruits and keeping them fresh, to the plastic clamshells big in the 1980's and those popular bagged salads that arrived a decade later in the 1990's . The top trend now is converting the plastics to biogdegradable wrappings according Soren Bjorn chief executive officer at Driscolls' the company that produces all sorts of fruit.

Other countries are also tackling this, Spain has a plastic tax. France has a severely limited plastic wrapped produce. The Europan is also adding more restrictions to stop plastic consumption across Europe. Canada is trying to hammer out a plan that could eliminate plastic packaging of produce by ninety-five per cent by 2028. Here , companies and scientists are experimenting with new ways of combatting the overuse of plastic wraps. There are some possible alternatives. One is bags from trees. An Austrian company is employing birch and beechwood trees to create celllulose for paper bags.Other companies are creatng netting from trees that can decompose in a few weeks. Then there are the films from surprisingly orange and shrimp shells.Most fruits and veggies now have an edible coating made from plant based fatty acids. This is sprayed on cucumbers, avocados, and other produce. Clamshells are now being tackled with the classic plastic being replaced by cardboard. This will be good for the more fragile fruits and vegetables.

How can plastic wrap consumption be  lessened. It will takes laws and innovative ideas to do such.It can help in a small way of protecting the environment.,

Spring Pastas

 Everyone thinks that pasta is for the cooler seasons like fall and winter.Yet there's nothing like a good Spring pasta. There;s so many different types of veggies you can add to the sauce>It's a fresh taste for a fresh season,

Gnocchis really shouldn't be classified as pasta yet they are. I found a really good brand at Lidl .It 

They came with their own sauce  which was tomato, bell pepper and zucchini coins. The gnocchi's flavor was elevated thanks to the different veggies

Keep in mi nd gnocchi and any pasta would benefit from a pepper and squash sauce or better yet a spinach pesto. This last is on my radar to make. Basil can be oo strong. Spinach has the right amount of sweetness and earthiness to bring out any kind of pasta's flavor. 

I like using in any Spring pasta. My Easter lunch was bunny , chick and egg shaped pasta - so cute - with my signature mushroom and spinach sauce. This is my all time favorite , because the spianch and baby bellas are perfect together.  Each complement each other and the pasta.All it needs is a pinch of garlic powder and that;s it. Another tasty sauce is fresh mint and peas, perfect with angel hair..An asparagus,lemon  and butter sauce is also a tasty combination.,

Pack away the heavy sauces. It's Spring, Time for lighter fare and lighter sauces.