rivers_bend

After watching Samin Nosrat's netflix show four times through in three weeks, I asked for her book for Christmas. I am OBSESSED with it. It's an absolutely beautiful book to hold and touch and look at, and Wendy McNaughton's illustrations make me so happy. And it's also beautiful to read. Samin is as good at writing as she is at laughing delightedly, and if you've seen Salt Fat Acid Heat, you know how good she is at that.

I've loved cooking for years, since I learned how by watching Ready, Steady, Cook on the BBC every evening back in 1995, and I rarely follow recipes and am pretty good at making things from whatever is around. One of the things I cooked often in England that I DID start with a recipe for, though, was Leek and Potato Soup. I don't remember what the recipe was now, but you sweated the leeks and used low-fat milk and vegetable broth at a high broth to milk ratio. Over the years I started adding nutmeg which was good, but by and large it was warming and easy to heat up at work, and didn't have chunks of vegetables which is my biggest complaint about soups in general, but wasn't anything special.

Yesterday at the grocery, they had a gorgeous huge pile of glistening leeks, and I thought, omg I haven't had leek and potato soup in a decade, lemme just make some. But lemme use Samin's advice to do it.

Things I knew I had to change straight up:

I cooked the potatoes in water salted to where it brought to mind the sea
I took advantage of the Maillard reaction to add extra taste
who needs low-fat milk when you have whipping cream
taste everything at every step

The ingredients are as follows:

one large leek
two fist sized red potatoes
two fist sized yellow potatoes
a good knob of butter (1-2 tablespoons)
a tablespoon of finely chopped bacon (I buy the big bags of it at costco, but a piece of chopped bacon or half butter half bacon fat would do the same, or skip this ingredient if veggie obvs)
8 oz whipping/heavy/double cream (I buy the shelf stable cartons at Trader Joes so always have some in the cupboard)
1/4-1/2 cup prepared miso broth
2 ladles of potato cooking water
1-2 cups plain water to achieve desired consistency
2 heaped tablespoons full-fat greek yogurt
kosher salt, nutmeg, and black pepper to taste

If you've never cooked with leeks before, it's good to know they can hide dirt in all their little layers. I cut off the root end and as much of the green ends as seem tough (this will depend on how fresh they are), cut them down their length and run them under the tap, fanning open the layers until the bulk of the dirt is out. Then I slice each half in half again lengthways, chop the quarters into slices (you will be pureeing them so whatever size pleases you), throw them in a colander and run them under water again, rubbing them between my fingers so all the layers come apart. If you have cooked with leeks before, obviously do your things :D

Melt the butter in a heavy-bottomed pan (I used my cast iron skillet) and when it starts to bubble, add the bacon and well-drained leeks. Cook over a medium heat stirring well to start, and then more occasionally as the steam stops billowing. you're looking for the bacon and the smaller pieces of leek to start to brown, but you don't want too much browning as you lose the fresh taste of leeks and only have browned flavor. When they start to brown, turn off the heat and add the 8 oz of cream, stirring well. grate the nutmeg and grind the black pepper into the cream and leeks at this point while it's all still warm. While those flavors meld (salty bacon, acid from the browning, fat from the cream), do the potato thing.

Peel all potatoes and chop into even sized pieces so they will cook evenly. Add to a large pot of GENEROUSLY salted water. Samin suggested diamond crystal kosher salt, which I had never used before, but of course I got some, because she is my hero and my future wife (I wish), and it is, indeed, very different from iodized table salt and the maldon sea salt crystals I've been using for years. As mentioned, she recommends salting water that you're gonna discard (as opposed to like rice or oatmeal water) so it tastes like you remember the sea. Boil the potatoes until cooked, and before draining, ladle two scoops of the cooking water into the pan with the cream and leeks.

With the potatoes in the strainer, pour the leeks and cream into your large pot and puree with a hand blender. Or, put in your food processor or whatever you have that makes chunky things creamy. If you have a hand blender, you're gonna blend again once the potatoes are in there, so you don't have to get it totally smooth at this point.

Add the potatoes to the pot and on a low heat, mash it all together with a potato masher (or rice the potatoes into the pan if you're a ricer not a masher). Add the miso broth and a cup of water. puree again with hand blender. taste for seasoning. I added more salt at this point, but if your miso is very salty or you salted your potato water more than me, you may not have to.

stir in more water until you have a consistency you like. keep stirring every minute or so until it's hot but not bubbling. Salt again if needed. Samin really is right that salt takes away bitter. I felt like the potatoes were still a little bitter at this point (I didn't like potatoes at all until my late 20s because they taste(d) so bitter to me) so I added another pinch.

and then the stroke of genius I wouldn't have thought of without Samin's advice. I stirred in two big tablespoons of greek yogurt to finish it. It was good before, but that step took it right over the top. (I spooned out a little soup into a prep bowl and added a tiny bit of yogurt to that to test it, so I didn't ruin the whole soup if it was a bad plan, but it was NOT a bad plan). I could have cried it tasted so good.

I ate it with a thick slice of yesterday's homemade oatmeal and emmer bread, lightly toasted and slathered with butter, but it would be really good with a salad or veggies if that's your thing.


Now I'm going to go make chicken thighs that I salted yesterday and got out of the fridge an hour ago :D