I make a lot of soups in fall and winter. One simple stew is just venison (can be made with beef). Small pieces of venison (1/4" cubed) dredged in plain flour and browned in 2-3 T oil. Add 3-4 qts of water, bring to a boil, reduce to a hard simmer. I like to cook the meat for about 30 minutes or so and then add sliced carrots and cubed potatoes. It takes the vegetables only about 30 minutes to cook, so you can just cook the meat until you are getting ready to eat.

My favorite to make is Tuscan bean soup and add spinach to heat before serving. My next favorite is white chicken chili! Enjoy hoe cake with both.

Rita, maybe not today with our 90 degree weather but when you have that soup ready to go, please give me a call and let me know when to come. I'll bring a nice bottle of wine or two.

Elmer, :-) We should have a Bay Area meet-up one day.

I am still in NYC. DS texted how delightful the weather has been this week without A/C.

PS I think I may actually make the soup even though I am away (we are in an apartment.) And we are on our own. Cooking while in NYC is a very foreign concept to me.

Glenda, the first time I made white chicken chili, My husband and son didn't care for it. I thought it had a lovely flavor. However, when you say chili, they were envisioning the consistency of regular chili and white chili is more soupy (even though I added extra cans of beans and pureed them. About six months later I made it again and DH asked what it was. I said Mexican soup.....exact same recipe.....he loved it!

Like Sherry, I stock up on soups for the freezer in the cold weather. It ha to be 36 or below so I can put the pot out on the porch overnight and let the fat solidify, remove and bag up. I stock up my freezer with quart-size bags stacked in plastic shoe boxes. DH can help himself to whatever he wants. Last night it was Manhattan clam chowder for him, turkey soup for me. I still have plenty to tide me over till February when I will begin stocking up again. For me, it's pea soup, Mulligatawny, Manhattan clam chowder, chicken soup, turkey soup, Mexican soup, beef chili and minestrone. I make other soups during the year but not in large quantities to freeze.

In this area, we do have chili soup, made with tomatoes, beans, beef or chicken, onions, tomato soup and other things including pasta. That is made more often than just chili. There are even Chili suppers at churches but it is chili soup, not just chili. I really like it better than just chili.

Sue

Yum Rita, that sounds good. Potato leek soup I've tried to make always turn out bland.

I love soups. DH isn't as big a fan so we don't have it as often as I'd like. I made a mushroom soup last week that was really good. Roasting the mushrooms makes all the difference.

I make Toscana soup with beans instead of sausage. Vegetarian chili. Corn chowder. I have a lentil tortilla soup I want to try once it cools down more. I only cook vegetarian but most soup recipes are easy to modify.

For Elmer, and anyone else who likes potato based soups, this Marcella Hazan soup is sublime. It is much lighter and more delicate than the basic potato based soups I make, yet still very simple to make. (If you try this, do top with homemade garlic croutons. And for vegetarians, vegetable stock should be a fine substitution. Marcella was from the region of Italy that consumes the most meat on Earth, I think. Really.)

https://books.google.com/books?id=1FVLv7WS4C4C&pg=PT173&lpg=PT173&dq=marcella+hazan+tricolore+soup&source=bl&ots=UukOrr4l0k&sig=A5loAUWSfjxKer0EnrTCNrm_zjM&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjKnYWB34nXAhWHwiYKHQKrBIQQ6AEIVjAJ#v=onepage&q=marcella%20hazan%20tricolore%20soup&f=false

Since I make Pasta e Fagioli at least once a month I guess that would be it. Last week I made it with dried cranberry beans (Rancho Gordo) for the first time. OMG! What a difference!

Tonight I'm making:

Butternut Squash Bisque

2 TB. olive oil

1 cup chopped onion

1 cup chopped carrots

6 cups butternut squash, cut in large cubes

1 teaspoon curry powder (or to taste)

1 teaspoon fresh grated ginger (or to taste)

S&P

4 cups chicken broth

1/2 cup half ’n half

In a large sauce pan, heat olive oil and saute onion & carrots until onion is translucent. Add squash and seasonings, stirring to mix well, then add chicken broth.

Bring to a boil, then cover and let simmer until squash is soft.

Remove from heat and puree with immersion blender. Add half ’n half. Return to heat to warm.

Yippee, I've been making minestrina triclore my whole adult life and never knew it! ;-) Leeks are in season right now, I made a scrumptious leek, asparagus, and spinach frittata on Sunday.

I'm a soup lover, too, and couldn't name a favorite. Since leeks have been mentioned, I really like my leek and cauliflower creamy soup. Yum.

Hubby loves soup, so I make it quite often in th winter. Raven's Shrimp Chowder is a favorite. Love a big pot of ham and beans (pintos), too.

I make my vegetable soup with browned and drained hamburger, onions, a can of diced tomatoes, some diced carrots, a bag of frozen mixed vegetables, handful or two of barley, bay leaf and basil, salt to taste.

One of my favorite soups is cheeseburger soup. It's rich but has such a good flavor. Now I'm wanting some!

I have been using boneless chicken thighs and breasts for chicken soup recently. I throw in an onion, lots of carrots, celery, some chicken broth, and water. Add fresh oregano, parsley, and basil. I puree the vegetables and shred the chicken.

I made 'everything from the frig' soup this weekend. The cauliflower was starting to turn, peppers were going to wrinkle, some old carrots, etc etc. And the butternut squash that I had on the counter since Thanksgiving weekend.

Sauteed a bunch of onions, added some curry and turmeric, and dumped everything in with chicken broth. Also some tomatoes that were ripening on the counter. A couple of potatoes to thicken it. Whizzed it with the immersion blender.

We had a bowl of that with grilled cheese sandwiches for dinner. There's been a lot of internet talk that mayo makes a nicer, crispier grilled cheese than butter. Hubby didn't want any part of it, so I did it. I didn't see any difference at all.....I'll stick with butter.

There's nothing in my soup pot but I really need to find the energy to get some soups made and in the freezer. I want to make veggie beef, chicken noodle, and chili soon. I save those big plastic tubs ice cream comes in to freeze soups in. One is a good size for the five of us with some left for boys lunches or mine. I try to get about 5 or 6 tubs of each in the freezer. Comes in handy and makes a great winter meal. The kids like a salad and crusty rolls with soup as a meal.

Rita how does that potato based soup you posted do frozen? It sure looks delicious. I think I will make it very soon. Thank You for posting the picture and recipe.

Schoolhouse I've never made hamburger veggie soup but I had it once. It was great. Think I'll add this to my soup list. Thank You.

Soup is something I could eat everyday. It's impossible to pick a favorite. Here is a delicious hearty soup I really enjoy.

Chi - like you, I am vegetarian and I think you would love this. Meat eaters like it, too.

Minestrone Soup

Our favorites are a bean and sausage soup, shrimp chowder, clam chowder, leek and potato and split pea. Unfortunately, the split pea no longer agrees with either of us, so I haven't made any in a very long time.

Mampinky I would not try freezing a potato soup. My husband and I learned that lesson the hard way after spending the entire day making an enormous batch of gnocchi. We thought stocking the freezer with the delicious potato morsels would be brilliant. As you probably know, that did not go according to plan. This was in the mid-1990s before the internet had as much good information readily available.

You could freeze the leeks. The potato part is the easiest bit.

ETA I just researched- they say not to freeze the leeks either- they go bland apparently.

I love homemade soup. I have many favorites. This is my favorite chicken tortilla soup.

chicken tortilla soup

I have frozen soups with diced or chunks of potato many times, haven't noticed any problems.

Love soups and stews. Favorite soup is probably chicken with ditalini. I throw in finely chopped carrots and celery and it’s so yummy and rich. Also love beef stew, seafood gumbo and Brunswick stew. And of course all those good potato soups.

Love soup!!!! I make a mean Greek Lemon Soup. It has garbanzo beans, celery, onion and carrots cooked in a chicken broth. I top it with diced avocado, cilantro and lemon. I use a good amount of cumin....delicious!

Rita, Thank You for the advice not to freeze potato soup. Its an easy quick enough recipe that it doesn't need cooked in bulk anyway. I'm going to make it this weekend along with homemade crusty french rolls and a salad. The boys will love it, hubs won't, but he's working the late shift over the weekend and won't be here anyway. Anyway Thank You.

I make a lot of soups -- oftentimes in the winter, either leftover vegetables or fresh vegetables simmered with onion in chicken broth, pureed, put back on the stove and add cream and then heat back to hot. Sometimes I'll put cheese in it (cheese and broccoli) but sometiems not and I don't make a pot but enough for the two of us with maybe a bowl leftover for a snack. In the winter, that's often lunch.

For "big" soup -- I do vegetable both with soup bones, beef, chicken and whatever vegetables I happen to have like carrots, celery, onion but I'll put in a parsnip, peas and corn if I have them and potatoes and a can of my home canned tomatoes. That's a simmer soup so low and slow.

Oh, and onion soup gratin is another long simmering soup that I love to make and will make a big pot of.

Ham and beans are soup to us and I make that often especially if I have a leftover bone.

Chili with beans.

Lentil soup with or without sausage

Fall and winter are often soup lunches and/or dinners at Linderhof.

I made a good soup the other day. I had gone to a small restaurant and tried this soup and decided I had to make it. I looked up a recipe on Pinterest and then tweeked it a bit. Green Bean Soup

I added 12 cups of water, 5 carrots and celery root.

Today is beef stew with red wine...YUMMMM

Jewels wow I used to love green bean soup. I haven't made it in a very long time. I'll have to make it soon also now that Im thinking how good it is.

And ham, cabbage, and potatos, yum one of my absolute favorites

Eta i remember when ham cabbage and potato soup used to be called depression food. Not with the price of potatoes now days.

Oh yeah I love that shrimp chowder. I need to make some soon.

I just made a pot of the 15 bean soup with boneless ham hocks, mostly big hunks of ham.

I like taco soup too. And of course I love a big pot of gumbo doesn't matter if it's seafood or chicken and sausage.

soup is a "dump" recipe I learned from my grandmother. veggie soup started with beef chunks and bones, if you had them, browned up in big soup pot. lots of onions, celery, and carrots. some kinda tomato product... crushed, whole, whatever. mandatory bay leaf... we called it the "prize" if you got it in your bowl... and NO, nobody choked to death on one. other veggies... whatever you had... corn, green beans, peas, cabbage. pot filled with water and simmered away till "done". if you wanted potatoes, you waited till last half hour so they didn't dissolve to mush. maybe a big handful of barley, navy beans or split peas.

split pea and navy bean were for when there was a ham bone available. bone, onions, celery, carrots, BAY LEAF and bag of dried split peas or navy beans. simmer till done.

While we were living with my Italian friend I learned the value of the bay leaf. She puts a bay leaf in every thing. I used it in several dishes but now I am going to use it more. I now have one in my dog's water bowl, adding it to water and making a tea with it is very good for the stomach and digestive system and really made a difference for Mia when we were living there. I now put some in the aroma cooker when cooking mia's chicken, it makes it smell much better and it is adding a little bit of flavor. The amazing thing that happened to Mia, she had a terrible buildup of plaque on her teeth which needed to be removed, she now has no plaque and her teeth look 100% better! The only change in her food was the addition of the bay leaves and the addition to her crunchy food a few times a little bit of a different crunchy food when I was low on her regular type. It is amazing. I was so concerned about having her put under anesthesia for a dental cleaning and now that plaque is gone. The lady told me that in Italy they use bay leaf a lot. She drinks bay leaf tea often.

Sorry I went a little off topic but wanted to mention this about bay leaves.