The Great American Slow Cooker Book (11 page)

1
Dump the tomatoes, onion, dried basil, Worcestershire sauce, sugar, olive oil, garlic, dill, and salt in the slow cooker and give it all a good stir.

2
Cover and cook on low for 7 hours, or until the tomatoes have broken down into a rich soup.

TESTERS’ NOTES

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Make this soup in the summer when tomatoes are at their finest. Then save it in quart containers in the freezer until winter, when it will provide a surprising spark of sunshine on a gray day.

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Nope, there’s no broth here. The tomatoes provide the liquid because the slow cooker forces it out of them.

•
We prefer dried herbs to fresh because they offer a more mellow finish to the soup.

Serve It Up!
Grate Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese over the bowlfuls.

1
Stir the broth, tomato paste, evaporated milk, cream, honey, Worcestershire sauce, dill, and nutmeg in the slow cooker.

2
Cover and cook on high for 2½ hours or on low for 5 hours, or until the soup is thick, rich, and creamy.

3
Stir the butter and flour in a small bowl to make a thick paste. Whisk it into the soup by the teaspoonful until smooth. Cover and cook on high for 1 hour, or until thickened.

TESTERS’ NOTES

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A velvety soup that needs nothing more than some fresh grinds of black pepper, this rich meal is best in the winter, when tomatoes are not at their best. Tomato paste saves the day!

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For the best results, spend ten bucks on several brands of tomato paste and do a taste test. Some will taste flat and dull, others will be too sour, and a few will be just right.

1
Stir the broth, corn, potatoes, onion, bell pepper, celery, wine, thyme, cumin, mustard, garlic, salt, and pepper together in the slow cooker.

2
Cover and cook on high for 3 hours or on low for 7 hours, or until the potatoes are very tender.

3
Use an immersion blender in the slow cooker, or ladle the soup into a large blender to puree it with the cream. Cover and cook on high for 15 minutes to warm through.

TESTERS’ NOTES

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Do you have to blend the soup? Of course not—you can leave it chunky.

•
To puree a soup in a blender, ladle about half into the canister, then stir in the cream. Take the center knob out of the lid, cover the canister, and set a clean kitchen towel over the lid. Blend until smooth, scraping down the inside of the canister once or twice. Pour the puree into a large bowl, then continue on, blending more. Finally, stir the blended mixture back into the soup. If your blender is too small to handle half the soup, particularly for the large batch in the large slow cooker, you’ll then need to work in batches.

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A fairly sweet white wine like a Viognier would complement the corn.

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Some heat might be welcome here; consider adding up to 1 teaspoon red pepper flakes for the large batch (less for the smaller ones).

ALL-AMERICAN KNOW-HOW
The top knob of the blender lid can be removed, specifically to help prevent blender explosions with hot ingredients. Pressure builds
under the cap, creating a little vortex. Soon enough, you have filthy kitchen cupboards. That said, when you remove that top knob to alleviate some (but not all!) of the pressure, cover the lid with a clean kitchen towel to forestall a small mess.

1
Melt the butter in a large skillet set over medium-low heat. Add the onions, reduce the heat to low, and cook, stirring often, until they are soft and glistening, about 20 minutes. Raise the heat to medium-high and cook, stirring almost constantly, to brown the onions a bit, about 5 minutes.

2
Scrape the onions into the slow cooker. Stir in the broth, brandy, thyme, bay leaves, salt, and pepper. Cover and cook on low for 8 hours, or until sweet smelling and rich.

3
Before serving, position the oven rack 4 to 6 inches from the broiler and heat the broiler. Lay the baguette rounds on a large baking sheet; divide the cheese among them, about ¼ cup on each. Broil until melted and bubbling. Float one of these on top of each bowl of soup.

TESTERS’ NOTES

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The slow cooker makes a simple job of this bistro favorite. The only hard part is getting those onions soft and sweet
before
they hit the slow cooker. That said, you don’t need to cook them as long as you might if you were simmering the soup on the stovetop because those onions are going to go even longer in the cooker.

•
Don’t use frozen chopped onions for this dish. They’ll be too soft and wet, and won’t caramelize well.

•
Originally, cognac would have been added to the soup, but brandy works just fine.

INGREDIENTS EXPLAINED
There’s not much good beef broth out there. The USDA sets the required formula at 1 ounce of beef (trimmings) for every gallon of water. Clearly, this ratio leads to a lack of flavor, which some brands fix with chemical additives including MSG (often labeled as “natural flavorings”). The best varieties are made with condensed beef stock, an ingredient on the label that ensures more beefy flavor in every spoonful.

1
Stir the broth, cauliflower, cabbage, bell pepper, sweet potato, tomato, onion, ginger, dill, garlic, salt, and pepper in the slow cooker.