Thursday, March 24, 2011

Donna Hay's chunky mushroom soup

Manufacturers of cream should totally reconsider re-evaluating their packaging. Currently, the sizes available for packets of cream are for 200ml or 1L. Like hello? 200ml is just too little as most of the times, I require 250ml, and 1L, it is way too much that everytime I open a 1L pack, I would have to plan ahead (yes, I mean calculations on actual paper) on how to use up the full amount! Why can't they start producing packages of 500ml? It would be perfect. I would really jump for joy if I see such a product in the supermarket aisle. But that's just me.

So anyway, I had leftover cream from an opened 1L pack of cream, and was wondering how to use it. There was an overabundance of ice cream in the freezer, so I thought I should think of another way to use it up, perhaps a cream of (something) soup of some sorts. I love mushrooms, so cream of mushrooms it shall be!

Medley of mushrooms - portebello, shiitake and white button
Bread loaf, sliced

The soup was really easy to prepare, and I breezed through the cooking (if you consider this cooking still cos it really didn't take much time - except for the time used to chop the mushrooms) without much difficulty. Taste wise, I wasn't really happy with the overall taste yet perhaps cos I feel as though there is just a little something missing from the soup. The flavour I guess, maybe cos I didn't add any truffle oil/cheese on top before serving like what Evan did. It's all the little touches that matter maybe? Texture wise, I should have blended it a little less to have more mushroom chunks in my soup (I prefer a chunkier texture).

Donna Hay's Chunky mushroom soup

Chunky mushroom soup (adapted from Evan at Evan's Kitchen's Ramblings)
30g butter
1 brown onion, finely chopped
500g mushrooms, chopped (i used a medley of white button, shiitake and portebello)
3 cups milk
1/4 cup cream
salt, cracked black pepper

Heat a large saucepan over high heat. Add butter, onion and mushrooms and cook for a few minutes or until the onions are soft. Add milk and bring to a boil.
Add cream, salt and black pepper.
Remove from heat and use an immersion handheld blender to blend soup until desired soup texture is achieved (smooth/chunky). Serve immediately with warm crusty bread.

8 comments:

  1. ohh it looks nice :) is it coz its not creamy enough? some recipes use flour and i think that might result in a thicker soup like how ppl put cornstarch in some chinese soups. and ya think nx time u can try blending them a little chunkier or leave some of them sliced just like that, dont blend them so there'll be two different textures.

    haha i second about the whipping cream but i would still buy 1L coz its more worth it. the small one has gone up by a dollar lor, last time only like $2.40 so i would buy, not anymore. i'd rather buy a big one and try to use it up or even throw (haha very bad i know) than to buy a small one. so this whipping cream was the leftover from our baking session? :)

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  2. I face the same problem as you all the time! I've to note down all the recipes which uses cream so that I can finish up the cream asap :)

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  3. Looks delicious! love the photo of the medley of mushrooms...simple and pretty.

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  4. evan: not the creamy thing ley, it's more like the taste as in taste heh. nope, the cream was from a previous pack..i made this quite a while back heh.
    janine: we shld totally do like a petition of some sorts haha. ^^
    bhavani: thanks!

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  5. This makes a nice lunch. I love the first photo. Nice composition.

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  6. All I had to do was Google banana recipes and found your "Caramel banana ginger crumble panna cotta verrines." I'm glad I stumbled upon your blog! BEAUTIFUL pictures!!! You've inspired me!

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  7. You saved a container of mushrooms in my refrigerator! It turned out really well. I think leaving it a bit chunky really helped the texture. I also added some cheese and a little bit of cornstarch (very tiny amount). A nice lunch. Thanks!

    I blogged about it, too. 
    http://autumnd.wordpress.com/2011/03/31/donna-hays-chunky-mushroom-soup/

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