Thanksgiving COUNTDOWN! (Recipe: All-purpose Mushroom and Onion soup)

Y’all.

Yesterday was the 3 week countdown hack to Thanksgiving.  My excitement levels just bumped up a little (Read: exponentially).  Did yours?

The older I get, the more I love Thanksgiving and am protective of it amidst the rush to blow straight into Christmas (I’m looking at you, Mariah!)  You can all put on your surprised faces when I tell you that I honestly love to prepare the entire meal.  No, thank you, I really don’t need you to bring anything unless it’s wine.  Maybe snacks.  But seriously, if you’re coming over, park your casserole dishes in their cabinet and just let me roll.  Over the last several years, I have honed the feast to a fairly consistent set of players:

• Fried turkey (both brined and injected beforehand)
• Dressing (the hubby’s Memaw’s recipe, but with my tweaks)
• Green bean casserole (semi-off-the-can-traditional — more on that in a minute)
• Dumplings (the noodley kind in a thick broth – my Grandmama’s recipe)
• Shaved brussels sprouts lightly sauteed with balsamic (a riff from the great Ina’s version)
• Cranberry relish (plus minus a can of the other stuff)
• Angel biscuits
• Pecan pie (dark karo only, please)
• Pumpkin and Ginger bread pudding (non gingerbread, two words)

So back to that classic turkey day staple: the green bean casserole.  You cannot throw a proverbial rock in the online food-writing community and not hit somebody’s post maligning the horrors of canned “cream-of-X” soups.  Earlier in my cooking years, I pushed this way a bit myself.  The thing is, you just can’t make a green bean casserole that tastes like Thanksgiving and all of the memories without the stuff.  Believe me, I’ve tried.  What you *can* do to elevate without deleting the nostalgia is supplement that goopy goodness with your own onion and mushroom soup base.  I make a huge batch of this stuff usually twice a year, freeze it in 1-2 cup increments and pull it from the deep freeze for a variety of applications.  It even eats well on its own with some croutons and melted cheese (alla Francese, if you will.)  It’s a pretty simple recipe, you’re just going to need a little hardware and some time.

Mushroom and Onion Soup

Hardware: 

• One large, preferably heavy pot or dutch oven (I usually grab my 10 quart cast aluminum)  *OR* your trust pressure cooker
• Immersion/stick blender (preferred) or a regular blender

Ingredients:

• Olive oil (standard stuff, put your fancy EVOO back into the cool dark of the pantry where It should be living!)
• 3-4 large sweet onions, sliced relatively thin
• 2 lbs (32 oz) mushrooms (I like to a roughly 50/50 mix of white button and cremini (baby bella) and maybe throw in a container of the variety mix), cleaned and chopped
• 1 carrot, chopped
• 1 stick of celery, chopped
• 3-5 cloves of garlic, peeled and crushed
• About a cup of dry Marsala wine (for my non-drinkers, this really does impart a special part of the flavor and is going to get aggressively cooked — but if you truly can’t, sub beef broth)
• 2 bay leaves
• 8 cups beef stock (chicken or turkey stock work as well; yes, homemade is always tastier, but not totally necessary on this one)
• 2 Tbsp veal demi glace (optional)
• Kosher salt
• Fresh ground black pepper
• 1 Tbsp ground thyme
• The juice of one normal sized lemon (or 3-4 splash-glugs from that lemon juice bottle that lives in the door of my fridge — judge away!)
• Dried parsley (your desired amount but I tend to dump in at least 4 Tbsp – I buy it in bulk!)

Methodology:

1. Soften/saute the onions in olive oil over shmedium heat – the goal here is cooking but not browning/burning.
2. Add the carrot, celery, and garlic cloves – keep cooking, stirring every once in a while until all veggies are softer (not mushy) and maybe are even starting to stick a little to the bottom of the pan
3. Deglaze with marsala wine (fancy term for dump in the wine and as it sizzles, scrape all that brown tasty goodness off the bottom of the pan with your spoon)
4. Add the mushrooms and stir to combine.  They’re going to start releasing their moisture into the mix and that’s great.  Keep stirring occasionally.  Continue to simmer where the mix is barely bubbling but not boiling for about an hour  *OR* pressure cook for 35 min 
5. Add the 2 bay leaves and the broth.  Continue to simmer where the mix is barely bubbling but not boiling for about an 90 min  *OR* Pressure cook for 45 min.  If pressure cooked, simmer it with the lid off after for a bit to reduce.
6. Stick-blend the soup to the desired smoothness.  Alternatively, transfer in parts to the stand blender and do the same.  (Either way, please be careful, it’s hot!)  I don’t go full, smooth here – I leave a little texture because I think it better replicates the little chunks in the canned stuff.
7. Season with salt, pepper, thyme, parley, and lemon juice. Reduce to the thickness you desire.
8. If you’re going to freeze it, I recommend letting the pot cool and putting the whole darn lot in the fridge overnight before divvying it up and freezing it.  It sets up on itself and ensures that your containers won’t do wacky stuff with warm soup going directly to the freezer (thermodynamics!)

If you’re not a big cooking person , this is a great start to injecting a little homemade love into your repertoire.  Keeping it simple on the seasoning makes it endlessly useful to sub into or enhance everything from casseroles to stews to your pot roast gravy!  Every batch may be a little different, but that’s ok.  Grab a glass of chardonnay and enjoy the ride.

Cheers!