Let me start by linking you to the photo credits and recipe of the soup 👆 that inspired my recipe. The original is called Million Dollar Soup by Southern Living. Looks delicious, doesn't it? But! It's too many steps and calories to become part of my repertoire. To stay healthy, I consume bacon and cream as occasional treats, but lighter fare most of the time.
Lighter dishes can be tasty too, and once you form the habit of eating healthy you crave healthily. My inspired recipe is a totally different soup that shares many of the same ingredients as its cream, bacon, and kale inspiration. Make my soup when you have leftovers, such as butternut squash or chicken. Without leftover chicken toss sliced frankfurters into the pot:
Leftover Butternut Squash, Chicken, and Spinach Soup aka, Billion Dollar Soup😉
Ingredients:
2 cups leftover cooked chicken, cubed (or use 3 - 4 grilled chicken or turkey or beef
frankfurters) 1/2 cup of grilled ham, cubed
1 onion, diced
1 cup celery, sliced
a minced garlic bulb or 1 teaspoon of dried garlic
1 teaspoon dried thyme
2 cups cooked butternut squash, cubed (Take a raw butternut squash, put a slit in it with a knife, and microwave it if you don't have leftovers.)
3/4 cup of dry white wine (if I don't want to open wine, I add a tablespoon of organic cider vinegar for taste)
5 cups water
2 large chicken bouillon cubes 1 teaspoon of black pepper (24 turns of the peppermill)
1 15 oz can of beans (navy, cannellini, pinto, pink, i.e., whatever you have in your cupboard)
a dash of Worcestershire sauce
a dash of soy sauce
3 tablespoons of all-purpose flour
2 cups of spinach (or substitute 1 cup of mixed vegetables, if you wish. Feel free to polish off your leftover vegetables. Soup is great for this.)
Optional: I'd add a cup of corn kernels to the soup whenever I had some for the texture. It plays nice with the rest of the ingredients.
Directions:
1) Brown the ham, onions, and celery (and if using, sliced chicken turkey, or beef frankfurters) in a skillet, not to cook, but for 5 - 6 minutes to bring out their flavor. After grilling, toss them into a stockpot.
2) Add the rest of the ingredients (except the spinach) to the stockpot. Season with Worcestershire sauce, soy sauce, and a tablespoon of cider vinegar (if you skip adding white wine). I like to add a dash of red pepper flakes for a hint of heat. Bring to a boil and simmer for 1/2 hour.
3) After the vegetables are tender, thicken the soup with 3 tablespoons of all-purpose flour mixed in 1/4 cup of water and pour into the soup while stirring. Let this simmer for another 5 minutes to cook the flour and thicken the soup. {If for any reason, you wish to thicken your soup without adding flour, you can put some of your cooked beans into a blender, then return them to your pot of soup.}
4) You can taste and add more seasoning as needed.
5) Turn off the heat and drop a handful the fresh spinach into the soup. Cover with a lid to sit for another 5 minutes. The spinach will cook in the hot soup. (Frankly, I like spinach better than kale, but feel free to use either. Kale requires more cooking time.)
Dip out into soup bowls, and pair it with hearty, crusty grainy bread and a smear of butter, brie, cream cheese, hummus, teawurst, or whatever you like. Alternatively, you could make buttery-garlic bread crumbs for the soup. The choice is between you and your waistline.
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