divian l conner: soup

Creamy Chicken & Dumplings

8:36 AM

(repost)

Here in the South there are certain comfort foods that you just know you will get during cold or rainy weather. Most people think chicken noodle soup, while here, I think chicken and dumplings or a nice chicken and rice. Oh yeah! So good. It is literally hot as all get out down here but today was such a rainy and downright dreary day, I was like, "chicken and dumplings, why yes, I shall!"

When I first started cooking for taste (yes, there was a time, I just threw things together and hoped for the best but alas I have moved on and actually care about the way my food tastes), I took the easy way out when it came to chicken and dumplings. You can go all semi homemade and used canned buttermilk biscuits cut into quarters or you can get your hands (and kitchen, and clothing, and floor) dirty. I like homemade because everything is better when its homemade and you and your family is worth the extra effort, right?

As messy and hard as it may seem, homemade dumplings are literally soooo easy.

So, let's start shall we?

You will need:

1 large boiling pot of water

2 maggi chicken bouillon cubes

3 cups of all purpose flour

1 stick of room temperature butter or margarine

1 1/2 cup of milk

1 Family Size can of cream of chicken soup

Cut/shredded chicken breasts

(I deboned a grilled whole chicken I had leftover from yesterday)

In large bowl, pour in your flour and add your butter. Using your hands begin mixing the butter by squeezing it...this begins to make "crumbs". You want to use your hands. Just squeeze until the butter is all crumbly in the flour. Make a hole in the center of the crumbly flour mixture. Slowly begin pouring in your milk.

Add only 1/2 of the milk into the hole then take the flour and cover the milk as if you want to bury it. Pat down and then bring in the sides. If it is still too crumbly, make another hole, add more milk....bring the flour sides over it just like before and pat down until it begins to form a dough, knead.

*This is also how you make biscuits but using self-rising flour*

Once the dough forms, form into a ball. Lightly flour the ball and place in between two sheets of wax paper or on a lightly floured surface. Roll out until even and the desired thickness of your dumplings.

Cut into squares. I like large dumplings and my kids literally love TONS of dumplings. This makes A LOT of dumplings so you can always place in a freezer bag and freeze any excess until next time.

Now on to the goodness.

In a pot, boil the water and add in your maggi cubes. Once boils, stir to make sure the cubes have dissolved and the seasoning they produce is even. Add in your sliced cooked chicken and while still boiling...drop in your dumplings.

Stir regularly.

Dumplings will float when they are getting close to done. Once the dumplings float, reduce the heat to low and cook (stirring occasionally) for 20 minutes.

Add in your cream of chicken soup and stir until your soup is nice and creamy. Remove from heat.

And there ya go! Nice, creamy, and heartily easy chicken and dumplings. There were no leftovers from this pot. It was enough to feed myself, 4 children ages 9-14 and a friend who came over for dinner. And two kids had seconds!

african

Liberian Pepper Soup

9:33 PM

Nothing says fall and winter better than soups and stews! My family loves trying recipes from all over the world. I like the fact that my kids are pretty open to anything I decide to make for them. It is also fun to explain to them how other cultures can use foods in a way different from us. I absolutely love this soup. It is amazing. Rich flavor, full and hearty. It is truly a win.

About a year ago, I traveled to Chicago on business. My client is Liberian and upon learning that, I was inquiring about authentic Liberian food. She told me of Pepper Soup and decided that I had to try it. When I first tasted it, I knew I had to learn this recipe. She was nice enough to not only share the recipe with me, but called her sister over to show me step by step.

Although a year later, I finally made it myself. It is a hearty soup, with a base of okra and eggplant. It is full of different types of meats. When my client made it for me, she included snail meat and fish. I can do without the fish and did not have time to clean snails, so I left those out of the soup I made.

It is not the easiest to photograph and looks like a hodgepodge of things but if you are like me and love to try different foods, this is definitely an easy one to make and so good!

You will need:

3-4 smoked neckbones
1 smoked turkey wing or leg
1 bag of mussels (cleaned, steamed and deshelled)
2 cups of cooked shrimp
3 medium crabs or crab legs
1 large eggplant (sliced into chunks)
2 1/2 cups of frozen or fresh okra
3 tbsp of Knorr Chicken bouillon

Optional
Fish (rainbow trout, cod)
Snail meat
Lime
Habanero pepper

Fufu or rice

Fill large pot with water and add in your chicken bouillon. Add in your smoked turkey and neckbone and bring to a boil. Once boiling, reduce heat to medium and cook for about 20 minutes or more, until meat is tender. Add in your okra and eggplant and cook for about 20 more minutes until they are tender. Remove the meat and sit aside. Remove the okra and eggplant and you can blend in food blender/processor until smooth and blended. Pour okra and eggplant back into the soup stock. Pull the meat from the turkey and place back in the pot, discarding the bones.

On low heat, add in your shrimp and mussels. Cook for an hour on low. Serve with a squeeze of lime, habanero for spice and fufu or rice. Find an easy recipe for fufu here if you are unable to get fufu mix.

biscuits

Fall and Chicken and Dumplings

5:47 PM

Nothing says fall quite like hearty soups, stews, chili and of course, chicken and dumplings.

With the orange and golden leaves blanketing the ground, we are slowly welcoming cooler weather here in the South. I can't say that it has been cold, but we have been enjoying a slightly less sticky and warm day with a slightly cooler night.

When the weather starts changing, I live for soups and hearty meals that will warm the kids and fill them up.

Despite it not being as cool as I wanted it to be, last night we enjoyed a great dinner of Chicken and dumplings. Usually I always pair it with cornbread but we switched it up to a nice thick french loaf for dipping into the creamy soup.

You can find the recipe for how I make my chicken and dumplings here. The only thing I did differently was add half a stick of butter into the soup once it was done cooking for a little fatty goodness. Super easy, super tasty and does not take long at all. The hardest part....cleaning up the flour you got everywhere.

cold

2 Soups That Warm The Soul

10:46 PM

So this weekend I had a shoot out of town. I stayed in a super fabulous hotel with two of my children and my best friend.

Life was good. The party went great. The hotel stay was great and my kids had a great time.

The only downside?

Traveling 3 hours back home in a car with no heat. Yes.

That was my life.

No heat.

While my teeth chattered and I reminded myself that many before heated cars, traveled way further with no heat, I got to thinking of the most warming foods.

And here you have it...while I suffered riding with my toes slowly turning to icicles and bundling coats on my little ones in the back seat, here are two recipes I think would more than warm the soul and your toes.

Brunswick Stew

From what I can gather of this, it is usually and typically made from any leftover meats and veggies you have from the week. I first heard of this when it was regularly on the menu in the winter months at the end of the week at the gas station down from my house. (Yep, gas stations in the south, have bonefide cooks and stuffs in their kitchens...aint no half stepping here!)

Menudo

My mom's family is from Texas. While they are not Mexican or of any other descent that I know of, they are very well versed in Mexican foods. I remember one Christmas spent with my late uncle, boiling a hog head and grinding it for tamales. It was epic. I never did taste those hog head tamales and nor did I ever taste his menudo.

When one of my cousins posted a bowl of homemade menudo, I was interested. I took to youtube and discovered that there was a canned Menudo that got rave reviews. While I still have to get over the texture of the tripe, this soup was so dang good! And I only had it from the can! I can only imagine what the real deal tastes like.

No matter what recipe you use, these are ideas to expand upon. Let me know what you think or if you have a recipe that will knock my socks off.

african

Liberian Pepper Soup: Coming Soon

11:13 PM

I traveled to Chicago last week and as always it was a food addict's paradise.

I had the honor and my stomach had the priviledge of dining on a traditional African dish: Pepper Soup.

Oh. My. Word.

It is not the easiest or most appealing thing to photograph but trust me. It. Is. GOOD.

Aint nothing like this soup. It kinda reminds me of the story, Stone Soup. A little bit of everything is put in this but the crushed eggplant, okra and tons of seafood make this dish spectacular.

Crab. Chicken. Roasted turkey. Fish. Neckbones. Snails. Mussels. Shrimp. Steak. It is like a meat heaven.

Add in some fufu and yes!

I will be recreating this dish soon. I only hope I can find snail meat locally. Here's to hoping the Asian Food Market has something for me. The snails is my favorite part.

cold

Winter Comfort: Soup Round Up

1:12 PM

We are preparing for a really cold day tomorrow so that has my mom in the kitchen preparing her homemade chicken noodle soup for dinner tonight. While we all bundle up and share our day over a bowl of soup, I thought it would be nice to share some other warm bowls of goodness that I have pinned on pinterest.

Make dinner a warm and soothing soup or stew night!

Love the idea of this creamy chicken and rice mushroom soup from The Spice Train.

I love tortellini so this soup from Heather Likes Food sounds amazing!

Puchero (Pork, Beef, and Chicken Soup) um, yes please! This looks like one great bowl of warmth!

Although this recipe calls for lamb and we do not have that here where I live, this would be fantastic with cubes of beef! Lamb and Potato Stew from Sinfully Spicy.

african

African Cassava Leaf Stew With Rice

11:45 PM

I just recently returned from a week long trip to Chicago. I was there to photograph the Chicago Fashion Week debut of children's fashion designer, Alexandria Olivia and I had booked a few headshot and editorial sessions.

While it was mostly work, I was there to also enjoy some good food.

Being in Mississippi, there are limitations as to what we can experience. I know, I know...but yes, it is true. The designer I was commissioned to work for is of African descent. While there in Chicago, I was so thankful to experience authentic African food that literally made me say, "yesssssss".

One of the foods I tried was called Cassava Leaf Stew with rice.

Oh my. It was so good.

Full of all kinds of meats and earthy ground leaves, it had me wanting to bring it on back to Mississippi.

And I did just that, I brought back some cassava leaves and palm oil -- determined, I made this delicous meal at home for my family.

I used beef neckbones, chicken, mussels and shrimp but the meat possibilities are endless. This is a hearty African comfort food that is perfect for these impending cool winter nights.

It was a hit and even my mom with her picky palate went back for seconds.

Here is a recipe I followed that you can try. Of course, cassava leaves and palm oil are not readily available in all areas. Check your local ethnic markets or online. It is so worth it.

*I served mine with parboiled rice. My mom, being the ultimate southerner and despite boiling the meat with a habenero, added hot sauce*

bacon

Grilled Chicken Noodle Soup: Holiday Leftover edition

4:04 PM

Christmas is officially over and we are now looking forward to the new year. The day after Christmas sometimes we just don't know what to do with leftovers but sometimes they can make a nice hearty and delicious soup! I made a chicken noodle soup to help warm my kids up during these cold Mississippi days and it was perfect. Of course, I used leftovers but you can easily make this soup with the ingredients fresh.

For Christmas dinner I made pineapple honey glazed carrots, brown sugar and bacon green beans, grilled chicken. I made much more, but these leftovers made for a perfect soup! I also had grilled huge onion steaks that I chopped up for this recipe and oh my word...yes!

You will need:

3 grilled chicken breasts

2 cups of steamed green beans (crumbled bacon optional)

2 maggi chicken bouillon cubes

6 cups of water

1 bag of egg noodles

4 roasted carrots sliced

1/4 of whole onion, chopped

Pour water in large pot and add bouillon cubes. Bring to a boil and add in noodles, reduce heat to medium. Chop carrots and add them to pot. Chop beans into thirds and add to pot. Add your chopped onion and then dice your chicken. At this point, you can taste the liquid in your soup and add a little salt/pepper to your liking. Reduce heat to low and serve hot once noodles are tender.

Since you are cooking with already cooked ingredients, this soup does not take long at all. Just wait for the noodles to become tender and voila! You are done!

Quick easy idea and great way to use leftover chicken you may have. If you have fresh carrots, skin them and you can bake them in a little olive oil at 350 until tender, so about 40 minutes. You can also use frozen carrots and beans.

bowls

Soup Bowls A'plenty...

9:00 AM

It is cooling down here in Mississippi and cooler weather means lots of delicious soups and stews are on the horizon. My family loves a good soup or stew so I have been online searching for more bowls. Who would have thought that the girl who once spent her time looking for new shoes would be so darn thrilled over the mere premise of shopping for bowls? Who has replaced me? So my searching has led to some awesome finds. Here are 4 cool bowls I found.