Modified canned vegetable soup

[redbird]

Cross-posting from the DW community cookingforpeoplewhodont, whose current theme is "half-homemade," meaning recipes that make significant use of canned, frozen, etc., foods.

This is a slightly higher-energy and more-flavorful version of one of the canned soups I grew up eating. I came up with it shortly after I had the gall bladder surgery, when I had so little appetite that a teaspoon of sugar in black tea four times a day was a significant part of my total calorie intake, and I didn't have the energy to even think about more serious cooking.


Ingredients:

• 1 can Campbell's vegetarian vegetable soup


• 11 or so ounces [325 ml] of chicken broth, homemade if you have it l(my partner and I tend to make and freeze broth for later use after he roasts a chicken) or from a carton.*


• Water (if you have less than a full soup-can of chicken broth)


• Powdered ginger

Procedure:
Defrost the chicken broth if necessary, either in a microwave or in a small saucepan on the stovetop.
Empty the can of condensed soup into a 1- to 2-quart saucepan.
Use the can to measure an equivalent amount of chicken broth, or chicken broth and water. Mix that with the canned soup.
Add a small amount of powdered ginger. Try a quarter teaspoon, or less if you don't like things gingery; more if you're another person who has to remind herself to go easy on the ginger because other people don't like it as much as you do.
Heat to a simmer, stirring a few times while it heats, and eat.

Optional extra: if you happen to have some leftover cooked chicken, and some appetite (because you probably aren't doing this less than a week after having surgery), cut up the chicken and add a handful while the soup is heating.

This is lunch for one person, or a starter or side dish for two or maybe three.

I suspect that this would work fine with beef broth, if that's what you had, but I haven't tried it. Ditto for other brands of canned vegetable soup, but you might have to adjust the quantities.

Note on the chicken broth: We tend to freeze it in units of one cup, one pint, and as ice cubes. We fill an ice cube tray with chicken broth. Put in the freezer for a day or two, then decant into freezer bags; those are a bit over an ounce each, and handy for adding a bit of chicken flavor to sauces. They can also be handy when I need between one and two cups of broth. Wash the ice cube tray after this before using for anything else.

*I tend to avoid canned chicken broth because most of it is saltier than I like, and some brands may taste of metal, but if you have one you know and like, go for it.

Comments

[don-fitch.livejournal.com]

Yup, as you speculate, something like that also can work well with beef or other (low-salt) broth or stock. I'll sometimes also add chopped other vegetable leftovers, and perhaps a bit of leftover take-out rice (caution is needed here; even steamed rice seems to exapnd a whole lot and become thuggish when added to soup).

Having a Community Gardens plot, I frequently suffer from a plethora of fresh vegetables, some of which are sufficiently quick-cooking to add to such a not-entirely-from-scratch soup -- beet leaves (chopped), a few small side-heads of broccoli, Parsley, scallions, edible-pod peas, and green beans work well. As with most soups, I almost always end up making too much, and have discovered that some small yogurt-containers are about the right size for freezing individual-serving portions.

[browngirl.livejournal.com]

This is an excellent recipe and an excellent method.