Lobster Bisque

In December, Kev and I went to this fancy French restaurant to celebrate 3 wonderful years as a couple. The restaurant had a fabulous tasting menu. It was about 15 courses! Our favorite was the restaurants signature dish, the lobster bisque. It was light and fragrant.

The following months, whenever we had lobster, i'd keep the lobster shells in the freezer to eventually make lobster broth for a bisque.

1 cup chicken broth or homemade lobster broth
2 medium slices onion
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
2 cups cream or milk
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 pound cooked and cubed lobster meat
1/2 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
2-3 tbs tomato paste
1 pinch ground cayenne pepper

1. if making homemade lobster stock, boil lobster shell in water and let it simmer for about 15-20 minutes.
2. In a small frying pan place 1/4 cup stock and the onion. Cook over a low heat for 5 to 7 minutes.
3. In a medium size pot over medium heat melt the butter. Slowly whisk in flour. Whisk until a creamy mixture is created.
4. Gradually pour in stock, whisking constantly. Whisk in milk, salt, onion, tomato paste, Worcestershire sauce and cayenne pepper. Heat until soup is almost boiling. Do not boil the soup as the milk will curdle when boiled. Simmer at low heat for about an hour. Add cooked lobster meat into bisque before serving.

The bisque was thick, creamy, and heavy, not what we had at the restaurant. But this was still good. More like a meal soup than an appetizer soup. I used heavy cream for this recipe, which I thought was too much. Next time i'd suggest using light cream or do 1 cup milk and 1 cup cream. The recipes takes quite a bit of time to make, but i'd make it again...if only it didn't make my house smell like lobster for 2 weeks.

Tom Kha Talay

I had about a cup of coconut milk in my fridge and I didn't know what to do with it. I thought about making coconut rice to serve with pork chops, or maybe make Sai Mai Lo ( a Chinese coconut tapioca dessert)...while browsing food blogs, i fell upon Noob Cook's Tom Yum Seafood recipe. I remembered I had Tom Yum Paste in the fridge as well and some frozen shrimp. All I needed was French green beans and some kind of white fish. I finally decided on mackerel. I love mackerel. During my search online, i found that the recipe with coconut milk, lemon grass, and seafood is not Tom Yum, but Tom Kha Talay. Tom Yum is usually a clear broth with no coconut milk.


2Tbs Tom Yum Paste (or more if needed)
2 cups + 1/4 cup (575ml) Vegetable broth
1 cup coconut milk
12-14 large shrimps/prawns
2 Mackerel fillets
Approx 15 green beans, ends trimmed, cut to about 2" lengths
1/3 hot chili pepper (green and very spicy)
1/2 Onion, chopped

1. Boil Vegetable broth and Tom Yum Paste.
2. Add mackerel, beans, hot chili pepper, and onions. Simmer 5 minutes.
3. Add shrimps. When boiling, add coconut milk. Remove from stove when it starts boiling again.

Unless you like your Tom Yum soup to be spicy, i think i'd omit the chili pepper. The soup tasted just right when I had just made it, but I guess overnight, it got really spicy. Not so spicy that you won't feel your tongue or anything crazy like that, but enough to make your nose runny. I also think I want to put some bamboo shoots and basil leaf in it next time. The shrimps were a little overcooked and chewy. I have to find out how restaurants always have their shrimp so good in the soup. hey probably only add the shrimp right before serving. I'd make this soup again with those changes. It was really tasty and a great winter soup. Not a soup for sissies.

Cilantro Carrot Soup

One of my new found favorite soups is Carrot Coriander. I discovered it when I bought one of those box soups by Knorr. They were on sale at Loblaws for $1.99. One box of soup is 2 portions, but if I don't have enough leftovers to bring as lunch, then I just grab a soup and some crackers. It's cheaper and healthier than buying my lunch at the food court.


For x'mas, Rachelle got me a gift card to Indigo bookstore. I've been wanting to buy a cookbook, but never knew which one to buy...there are just so many. So when I went to buy one, Rachelle pointed out a couple of them to me. The one that I finally decided on was "Just 5 Things: Gourmet Cooking with Just a Handful of Ingredients" by Rachel Lane. The cookbook has beautiful pictures, which I love. I consider the book to have great base recipes that I could modify to my liking. I spend days flipping through the cookbook and fell upon a coriander carrot soup recipe that uses only 5 ingredients. I went online and looked for several carrot soup recipes. I finally modified it like this:





6 large carrots, peeled and sliced
4 cups vegetable broth
1/4 cup chopped onions
2 cups 2% milk or cream
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon white pepper
1 pinch cayenne
1 Tbs cilantro (coriander)
1 potato, cubed
1 garlic bulb, minced

1. Boil the carrots and potato in the water until tender. Drain and puree in a food processor.


2. In a large pot, cook the onion and garlic in a ladle-full of broth, until tender and translucent. Add the vegetable broth, milk and carrot/potato puree. Simmer for 3 minutes. Stir in the seasonings (salt, pepper, cayenne, and cilantro). Simmer for 5 minutes longer.

The soup was yummy, but I was a little heavy with the cayenne pepper. I also used an extra teaspoon of cilantro. I bought those frozen cilantro cubes at the store. They are quite good and it's more convenient. I also didn't want to use my blender to puree the potato and carrots, because I was too lazy to wash it. I mashed the veggies with my masher, but the soup ended up being too chunky. So I used a mesh spoon to fish out as much veggie as i could and pureed most of it. Much better. Next time, i'll puree it as instructed in step 1.

Chunky Cream of Potato Soup

I'm carb queen. I'm pretty sure that if I gave up carbs, i'd lose a lot of weight, however, I just love carbs too much...One of the ultimate comfort foods for me is a nice bowl of potato soup. It's just sinful. One of my favorite places to have potato soup is at Baton Rouge. Last week, when Kev and I were trying to decide what to have for supper, I had suggested a soup dinner. Kev was hesitant because he was afraid it wouldn't be filling. Potato soup is extrememly filling. I just had this for lunch in a tupperware of about 2 cups of soup and i'm about to fall into a coma. I can hardly eat the celery sticks i brought in. Finally, that night, we didn't have soup dinner. we had steak. So the other night I decided to make it while he had his leftover char siu from Chinatown. I found the original recipe online, but tweeked it a little. This is the first time i've made my own potato soup.

4 medium potatoes, peeled and cubed
1 1/2 cup of water
3/4 cup chopped onion
1 small carrot, chopped
2 garlic bulbs
1/4 cup chopped celery
1 1/2 cups chicken broth
3 tablespoons butter, cubed
3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
2 1/2 cups milk/half & half/ cream
1 tablespoon minced fresh parsley/ dried parsley
3/4 teaspoon salt (more if needed)
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon of dried thyme
dash of garlic powder
1 cup shredded Swiss cheese / cheddar
bacon bits (optional)

1. In a large saucepan, combine the potatoes, onion, carrot, celery and broth + water. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat; cover and simmer for 12-15 minutes or until vegetables are tender; lightly mash.
2. Meanwhile, in a small saucepan, melt butter; stir in flour until smooth. Gradually stir in milk. Bring to a boil; cook and stir for 2 minutes or until thickened. Stir into potato mixture. Cook and stir until thickened and bubbly. Add parsley, thyme, garlic powder, salt and pepper. Remove from the heat; stir in cheese until melted. Add bacon optional.

When I made the recipe, I only had one can of chicken broth in the pantry. It's about a bit over a cup of liquids. So I topped the required 1 1/2 cup of chicken broth with water, but the liquids hardly covered the vegetables that need to be tender enough to mash. So I added an extra cup and half. Knowing this would make the soup more bland, I had to add more salt. At this point, it's taste over health. I'll try a healthier version of this soup on my second try. I added dried thyme to the recipe for more taste and a dash of garlic powder. I also chopped some garlic and probably added more celery than needed. The result was absolutely delicious. I had co-wrokers try my soup and one said it's restaurant quality and another said i should open my own restaurant. LOL I'll call it Carb City. LOL