Soupçon

Kate Flora: I’ve been doing a lot of cooking lately because of summer guests and that has sent me back to my old wooden recipe box. The trouble is that when I open it, I get stuck there. The box is a trip down memory lane. I can thumb through it and find not just food that I associate with special people and special occasions, but also familiar handwriting. There are even some small blue cards with my own early and awkward cursive. I’ve had the box since I was about eight, and over time, the cardboard dividers have disintegrated so that I have to thumb through the whole box whenever I want a recipe.

My mother used to type recipes to go in my box

The other day, I was prowling through the box, looking for something to cook, and found Judy Dickson’s black bean soup. I was carried through law school on a tide of Judy’s soup. Judy was a little older, had a decent apartment, and was nurturing. She was also a great cook. Our study group met at her place not just because it was pleasant but because we could always count on being fed. Food, it is said, is good for the brain, and mine was well nourished. I doubt that most lawyers associate law school with soup, but thirty years later, I still do.

Sadly, last year we lost Judy, and now making her soup will become a memorial act. Her soup and her stuffed cabbage known as the “heartburn special.”

Maybe it won’t make you smarter or turn you into a lawyer, but here’s Judy’s recipe:

Judy’s Black Bean Soup

1 c. dry black beans

¼ c. oil

1 c. chopped onion

1 c. chopped celery

2 cloves of garlic, crushed.

2/3 c. raw brown rice

5-6 c. stock

½ t. dry mustard

1/8 t. cayenne pepper

2 whole cloves

1-2 t. salt

1 bay leaf

Cook beans ‘til tender; drain and mash slightly. Save water for stock. Heat oil in a large pan sand sauté onion, celery, garlic and rice until veggies are soft. Stir in 1 c. stock & simmer while adding herbs & spices. Add rem. stock and beans. Simmer 1 hour or until rice is tender. You can mash some of the beans to make it thicker. Serve topped with plain yogurt.

Soup was then, and still is, a comfort food. So many people associate soup with comfort and nurturing that chicken soup is a universal remedy for disaster, distress, and the common cold. I even put chicken soup in one of my early mysteries. In Death in a Funhouse Mirror, Thea arrives to comfort her old college roommate whose mother has been murdered. Remembering how she was comforted with soup after her husband died, Thea brings supplies, and as soon as she’s through the door, she begins to cook a pot of soup. As she throws together a pan of blueberry muffins to go with the soup, detectives interview her about the dead woman, Helene Paris, and Helene’s family. Then everyone—Thea and Andre, the victim’s husband and daughter, the husband’s boyfriend, and the detectives, sit down to a most uncomfortable meal.

Fran’s Muffins

2 c. Bisquick

¼ c. sugar

1 c. sour cream

1 egg

1 c. Maine wild blueberries

Beat with a fork and add the fruit. Top with sugar & lemon peel & bake at 425 for 20-25 minutes.

There was a brief interlude between when I stopped practicing law and when I became totally immersed in writing in every free moment when I used to join some other neighborhood mothers for lovely ladies lunches. At one lunch on a fall day, we sat in someone’s bright kitchen and watched fall leaves drifting down beyond the floor to ceiling windows. It was cozy and companionable and represented one of the rare times when young mothers ever actually sat down. Along with a crisp green salad and some warm bread, this is what we ate:

Pumpkin Mushroom Soup

½ lb. mushrooms

½ c. chopped onion

butter or oil

2 T. flour

1 T. curry powder

3 c. chicken broth

1 can pumpkin

1 T. honey

dash of nutmeg. Salt and pepper

1 c. evaporated milk

Saute mushrooms and onion in butter or oil. Add flour and curry and stir. Gradually add broth. Add everything but milk and cook, stirring, for 10-15 minutes. Add milk and heat through without boiling. May top with sour cream or yogurt.

Everyone thinks that having the writer’s life must be ideal—all that flexibility and time to myself must leave me free for errands and reading and shopping and cooking—unlike the poor office slave. But the opposite is true. Since I’m my own boss and my office is just steps from the bedroom, I make myself work all the time. That means I’m as eager to embrace quick and dirty recipes that can be produced from the cupboard as anyone. My friend Nancy McJennett’s Mulligatawny Soup is a perfect one. I once made it to great acclaim when I returned from driving my son back to school up in New Hampshire and returned to find an extra eight unexpected guests for dinner. Here’s that recipe:

Mulligatawny Soup

I began to collect quick and dirty recipes when I started including them in my newsletter, “Yours in Crime, Kate Flora.” They were attributed to Thea and her busy lifestyle, but they fit mine, as well.

Great recipes are everywhere, and most cooks are happy to share them. One generous person was Cheryl Anzaldi, the librarian at a local voc-tech high school, who invited me to speak about my true crime book Finding Amy, to all of the freshman and sophomore English classes at the school. Speaking for six periods to literally hundreds of students is a grueling task, but the students at Tri-County were a wonderful group, and Cheryl was determined to everything she could to get them interested in books and reading. During our lunch break, we went to the café where the students who are learning culinary arts made us lunch, and we talked about food.

Cheryl loves to travel and loves to cook Italian food, and the second day I visited, she gave me this wonderful “kitchen sink” soup recipe from her Italian Family Cooking cookbook.

Minestrone

1 large head cabbage (2 lbs. preferably savoy)

3 T. olive oil

1 lb. very lean Italian sweet sausage, casing removed, crumbled

1 lg. yellow onion, finely chopped

1 can Italian plum tomatoes, juice included, coarsely chopped

1 T. salt

1 t. fresh ground black pepper

2 t. sugar

2 T. fresh minced basil or 2 t. dried basil

6 large carrots, diced

8 large celery ribs, diced

2 ½ quarts chicken broth

½ c. Arborio rice

1 20 oz. can kidney beans, drained

1 20 oz. can cannelloni beans, drained

freshly ground parmigiano or romano cheese for serving

Shred cabbage & set aside. In 8-quart stockpot, heat oil until haze forms. Add sausage, turn heat to low, and sauté just until it loses its pinkness, about 3 minutes. Add onion and sauté until soft. Add tomatoes, salt, pepper, sugar and basil. Cook 15 minutes. Add cabbage and cook until limp. Add carrots and celery. Cook, stirring, another five minutes. Pour in broth and bring to boil. Then lower heat and simmer, stirring frequently, until vegetables are cooked, about 45 minutes. Stir in rice and cook over low heat 10 minutes. Stir in beans. Cook, covered, another five minutes. Remove from heat and let soup rest 2 hours. Skim fat from sausage if necessary. When ready to serve, reheat. Ladle into bowls and top with freshly grated cheese.

In An Educated Death, Thea is consulting at a private school during the holiday season. When the secretary bemoans the challenge of having to put together a holiday party, Thea starts reeling off suggestions.

Take half a pound of smoked trout or bluefish, toss it in a food processor with a package of cream cheese, some lemon juice and horseradish, and mix. Serve with crackers and sliced cucumbers. Next, a can of crabmeat, another package of cream cheese, a little lemon juice and a teaspoon or two of curry power, mix together and bake for about 25 minutes. Remember that people are always impressed by piles of food, so piles lots of shrimp on a bed of lettuce, hollow out a red pepper and fill it with cocktail sauce in the center, and serve. Likewise, arrange a package of baby carrots, snap peas, strips of red, orange, and yellow peppers on a platter, then hollow out a small red cabbage and a small green cabbage, fill one with ranch dressing, the other with honey mustard. And finally, separate endive into spears, fill the wide end with softened herb cheese, arrange like flower petals on a tray, and sprinkle with sprouts.

While Joe Burgess is usually too busy to cook, he does occasionally take over in the kitchen when Chris is tired. But he’s an even more “don’t use a recipe, just throw it all together” cook than I am, or Thea is.

I know what you’re thinking: Sorry, Kate, but it’s too hot to cook right now, except out on the grill. Still, if you have any quick and dirty recipes for the next Thea Kozak mystery, please share them in the comments.