Lately, I’ve been spending a lot of my weekends in our hometown of Ely. When Sunday afternoon rolls around, I find it harder and harder to leave so I usually stall by parking myself on a bar stool at my favorite establishment, The Boathouse Brewpub & Restaurant. Since I eventually have to drive 4 hours home, I usually trade the brew for a diet coke or water, and watch as my friends (who live in Ely, lucky dogs) enjoy adult beverages. Every once and a while, the barkeep (who I may or may not be dating…) will let me have one drink, and then cuts me off- he’s so responsible. Anyway, on one of these Sundays, I happened to notice that roasted red pepper soup was the soup of the day, and had the brilliant idea to take a cup to go, knowing I wouldn’t make it home in time to pack myself a lunch for work the next day. Let me just write, I was very pleased with myself at lunchtime on Monday, this soup was good! So, I decided I would try to make it myself; I have no idea what the Boathouse puts in their soup, but I’ll give them credit for my inspiration.
Here’s what I used:
To make the roasted peppers, cut the red peppers in half hot dog style (lengthwise), gut them, and place them cut-side down on a baking sheet. Stick them in the oven and broil them for about 15 minutes, or until the skins turn black in spots and they look wrinkly. You’re supposed to peel the skins off the peppers, but that seemed like a lot of work to me, so naturally I skipped that step.
Take the peppers out and trade them for the cauliflower. Spray the cauliflower florets with olive oil, and roast them in the oven at 425 for about 25 minutes.
While the cauliflower is roasting, chop the onion and garlic. Pour a couple tablespoons of olive oil into the bottom of a large sauce pan, add the onion, garlic, and red pepper flakes. Saute them over medium heat until the onions are soft and the garlic starts to smell amazing. While this is happening, chop up the red peppers and add them to the onions and garlic when they are done sauteing.
When the cauliflower is roasted, chop it up and add it to the peppers, onions, garlic.
Pour in the milk and 1 cup of the chicken broth. Use an immersion blender to blend everything together, maybe 2 minutes until you have the consistency you like. If you don’t own an immersion blender, you could use a normal blender, but seriously-get an immersion blender, my Cuisinart immersion blender
At this point you can add the rest of the chicken broth, paprika, ancho chili powder, salt and pepper, stir it up nice, and simmer 5-10 minutes. I used ancho chili powder with the paprika to add a little smoky flavor.
Now just ladle (can ladle be a verb?) the soup into bowls and sprinkle some goat cheese on top. I was quite please with the goat cheese addition, it adds some softness to the zesty soup.
If you find yourself in Ely, stop in to the Boathouse for a beer, and make sure to say hi to the bartender for me 😉
To save time, you could use jarred roasted red peppers instead of roasting your own. Also, if you’d like it creamier, use more milk and less broth, or if you want to go vegan, replace the milk with an additional cup of broth (and obviously switch up the chicken for a veggie broth) and ditch the goat cheese.
- 4 red bell peppers
- 1 small head of cauliflower, cut into florets
- 1 medium yellow onion
- 6 garlic cloves
- 1 c. milk
- 3 c. chicken broth
- ½ t red pepper flakes
- ¼ t paprika
- ¼ t ancho chile powder
- salt and pepper to taste
- goat cheese crumbles
- Cut the peppers in half, remove the seeds and pulp, place cut-side down on baking sheet and broil in the oven for 10 minutes
- Spray the cauliflower florets with olive oil and roast in the oven at 425 for 25 minutes
- Chop the onion and garlic, saute with the red pepper flakes in a large sauce pan
- Chop the roasted red peppers and cauliflower and add to the sauce pan
- Add the milk and 1 cup of the broth, use an immersion blender to blend all ingredients until you achieve a smooth consistency, about 2 minutes
- Add the remaining broth, paprika, chile powder, salt and pepper and simmer for 5-10 minutes until hot
- Sprinkle on some goat cheese and enjoy!
[…] because I thought it would be hard, and was probably unnecessary (similar to my experience with my roasted red pepper soup), but it turned out that the skins really just pull off if you pinch […]