Diet, Dessert and Dogs

[I thought it would be fun to run a little series over here at DDD: I'll profile one one of my favorite foods, or a food that I've recently discovered and enjoyed, over several days.  The series is presented on an occasional (and entirely arbitrary) basis, before I move on to the next lucky comestible. This is the third entry on apples.]

Did you win the Trail Mix Giveaway?  Don’t forget to check here!

And now, our Lucky Comestible Apple series moves on to the soup course of the meal. . . 

This soup is an all-time favorite of mine.  One taste, and I promise you’ll be a devotee, too.  Hey–this soup should have its own fan club!  No, this soup should be featured on YouTube! This soup is a souper-star.  You will love this soup!

Seriously, if you don’t love this soup, I will eat my hat  my words  my way through the northeastern states your portion as well as my own!  I would marry this soup if I could.  I LOVE THIS SOUP THAT MUCH. (sorry, HH–nothing personal).

In fact, I’ve been dreaming about this soup, on and off, for the past 20 years or so.  I first encountered its enticing, tart and textured charms almost two decades ago, when I was invited to my former office mate’s home for dinner.  Besides being strikingly beautiful (she had worked as a model for a while before teaching) and incredibly hip, Ms. Mate was also the very first vegan I knew personally (as if beauty and cool were not intimidating enough). I couldn’t believe I’d scored an invitation–I mean, Ms. Mate wore Yves St. Laurent jackets–to teach in!  And she donned funky wigs, just for fun!  She had a voice like Kathleen Turner and looked like Brigitte Nielsen (well, when the latter was still pretty); and I was in awe of her.

I don’t remember the rest of the meal, but that night I was served a standout apple and red wine soup (after the salad, I might add), and was immediately smitten. The slightly tannic base, thick with puréed apple and red as a lover’s blush, was oddly mesmerizing. I begged her to share the recipe.

Once I’d copied it meticulously from her cookbook (the name of which has dissipated forever into the ether of my age-addled memory), I took it home and filed it in my “soups” recipe folder.  There it lay, neglected and withering, for months at a time.  Whenever a special occasion would arise–a dinner party, say, or the holidays–I’d determine to revive the apple-red wine romance, slide the page from the folder, place it on the counter, and leave it there it lay for a few days, before I sheepishly returned it to its resting place.  For one reason or another, I never made it again.  

As soon as I decided to run this Lucky Comestible series on apples, however, I knew which soup recipe I’d use. Last week, I strode  over to my cookbook shelves and withdrew the “Soups” folder once again.  I began to leaf through the recipes. . . then checked again. . . then went through them all, one page at a time.  Horrors!–the soup recipe was gone!!

I can’t adequately express the devastation I felt at realizing I’d somehow either lost or misplaced that recipe. I simply couldn’t imagine leaving it out.  It’s the perfect “Let’s-try-something-different-this-holiday-season” soup,  the perfect “let’s-wow-the-guests” soup, the perfect “I-love-you-be-my-Valentine” soup. Besides, I hadn’t eaten it in 20 years, and the memory of that unique flavor and texture was still compelling.  I decided to try to reproduce the soup from the taste memory. 

I’m happy to report that the results were stellar.  Not only did I fall in love all over again, the HH was besotted, too. 

“Hey, this tastes like real food!” he enthused.  (I stared blankly.)  “You know, like it has butter and cream and maybe even meat in it.”  (For the HH, that is a compliment. But no, there’s no taste of meat in it.) 

My soup isn’t quite as red as I remember the original being, but the flavor was just as I’d dreamed it.  Thick, rich, and full bodied, with a slightly creamy texture that’s nevertheless robust, both warming and filling.  The flavor is definitely that of apple, yet savory and slightly piquant at the same time.

I still love this soup, and am thrilled to have had this reunion, two decades later.  And now you can fall in love, too.  This would be perfect to serve if you’re looking for something a little different this Thanksgiving. 

Just don’t forget where you filed the recipe. 

Apple and Red Wine Soup

This is a great first course for a festive holiday meal.  As such, serve in small bowls or soup mugs–the soup is filling, and you want to leave room for the rest of the meal!  This also makes a perfect winter’s lunch with a salad and big hunk of crusty bread.

1 large onion, chopped

4 large crisp apples, peeled, cored and diced (I used MacIntosh and HoneyCrisp)

2 cups (480 ml) vegetable broth or stock

2 Tbsp-1/4 cup (30 ml-60 ml) maple syrup, to taste, or 10 drops stevia

2 tsp (10 ml) cinnamon

pinch nutmeg

1/4 tsp (1 ml) cloves

2 tsp (10 ml) freshly grated lemon zest

1 Tbsp (15 ml) fresh lemon juice

1/2 cup (120 ml) drinkable dry red wine (or use unsweetened cranberry juice for ACD-friendly version)

1 Tbsp (15 ml) arrowroot powder

1/2 cup (120 ml) full fat coconut milk, plus more for garnish

Heat the oil in a large pot or dutch oven over medium heat.  Add the onion and apple and sauté until the onion is translucent and the apples begin to give off a bit of liquid, about 10 minutes.

Add the broth, maple syrup, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, lemon zest and lemon juice; lower heat.  Cover and simmer until the apples are tender, 15-20 minutes.

Meanwhile, mix the arrowroot with the coconut milk in a small bowl.  Once the apples are tender, add the coconut milk mixture and stir to blend well.  Allow to cook for an additional minute, until thickened.  Turn off heat.

Pour the mixture in batches into a blender, or use an immersion blender, and blend until smooth.  Return the soup to the pot, stir in the wine, and return to heat until the soup is heated through, about 5 minutes.  Garnish with a drizzle of coconut milk, if desired.  Makes 4-6 servings.  May be frozen.

ACD adjustments:  use stevia instead of maple syrup, and unsweetened cranberry juice instead of the red wine.

Last Year at this Time:  Eggplant “Caviar”

Other Posts in this Series:

• Lucky Comestible 6(1): Roasted Red Pepper and Apple Dip
• Lucky Comestible 6(2): Classic Waldorf Salad
• Lucky Comestible 6(4) Potato Terrine with Apples and “Goat Cheese”
• Lucky Comestibel 6(5) Giant Baked Upside Down Apple Pancake

Other Apple-Based Recipes You Might Enjoy:

• Tofu Omelet with Sautéed Apples and Sweet Curry Sauce
• Apple-Quinoa Cake (gluten free)
• Earth Bowl Breakfast (yikes! Getta loada that photo!)
• Apple Noodle Pudding (Kugel)
• Grown-Up Baked Apples with Walnuts and Figs
• Mock Green Papaya Salad

Other Lucky Comestibles:

• Lucky Comestible 1: Sweet Potato
• Lucky Comestible 2: Quinoa
• Lucky Comestible 3: Avocado
• Lucky Comestible 4: Coconut
• Lucky Comestible 5: Cilantro

© 2009 Diet, Dessert and Dogs

It’s my obstreperous streak, probably.  Today, barely the second day of Holidailies–during which I’ve pledged to write in this blog with unwavering regularity–and already I’ve decided I don’t want to adhere to my self-imposed schedule of writing topics. 

Well, that’s not entirely true.  It’s not the topic, so much, that I don’t like, as the results of focusing on the topic.  For today is the Day I Must Record My Weight for all of the Blogosphere to See.  All right, perhaps I’m being a bit histrionic. Let me correct that:  For today is the Day I Must Record My Weight for all of the Four People Who Read My Blog to See. 

Despite snow drifts as high as my knees, I ventured to the workout club, as usual, this morning.  Had a fairly good go at the machines and free weights among the early-AM regulars (Good morning, Septuagenarian Italian Couple with the Matching T-Shirts!  How ya doin’, Elderly Gentleman Who Always Wears Black Knee Socks!  Top o’ the Mornin’ to ya, Burly Guy Who Stares at Women’s Breasts Between Sets!).  Still, I knew that last night’s dinner with my friend Deb (plus those two glasses of our latest favorite–and highly economical!–red wine) would waylay my otherwise descending weight. 

It’s a burden to always be right, I tell you.  Got on the scale with great trepidation to find my worst fears realized, with a weight gain of .5 pounds . So, rather than allow that disappointment to alter my mood and blow a black cloud over my otherwise cheery countenance, I started to reassess this idea of regular weigh-ins.  Yes, after only five weeks of them.

A couple of months ago, in her regular column in a prominent women’s magazine, Geneen Roth talked about this issue.  Why weigh yourself at all, she asked, even if you are trying to lose weight?  It’s a lose-lose situation (except for the number on the scale, that is). 

If the number goes up, you may have previously been feeling pretty self-satisfied, you may have been wearing your new Lululemon sweats like a banner-covered swimsuit at the Miss Universe Pageant, you may have been holding your head high feeling slim and taut and flat in all the right places–only to have that delusional euphoria instantly deflated, your mood for the day permanently altered by the fact that you’d gained 3/4 pound.  Even if you’d had no idea before stepping on that scale.

If the number goes down, it will probably only reinforce what you already knew, anyway:  you’ve been feeling better, lighter, lithe-r; your clothes are starting to loosen; and you’ve been walking just a little bit taller down those supermarket aisles.  Do you really need a scale to tell you all this?

The upshot is this: if you gain weight, do you really want to know?  And if you lose weight, don’t you already know? If the true goal is to focus on healthy eating and ultimate optimum body weight above all, can’t that be accomplished without the aid of a small, square, possibly incorrectly-calibrated mechanical object?

About three years ago, my older sister (let’s call her The Nurse) had a wicked crush on a coworker who didn’t happen to be her husband. And though nothing but a benign friendship ever came of it, she was consumed by guilt on a daily basis.  I mean that literally: she basically stopped eating food most of the day, and her guilt apparently ate up up excess body weight, somewhere in the vicinity of 60 pounds over 5 months. 

Did she use a scale to track this progress?  No, of course not; she wasn’t even aware of trying to lose weight initially.  Did she notice that the pounds had melted away?  Of course she did; her clothes hung like tarpaulins on her newly slimmer frame, she was forced to go out and purchase new clothing, even down to her operating room scrubs; and everyone she’d ever met in the world commented on how great she looked (ironic, huh, since she felt like crap about the illicit crush thing going on).

In any case, here’s my point: if my quest is to become a “normal” eater, I need to behave like one.  And all the normal eaters I know don’t weigh themselves compulsively on a weekly/daily/hourly basis, if at all.   And as soon as I even write down that thought, I can feel the fear in the depth of my (all-too-expansive) stomach, conveying the message, “But if you don’t weigh yourself regularly, how will you put the kibosh on that rising number?  Won’t you just spiral out of control and suddenly start bingeing recklessly and gaining more and more without end?”  Uh, I hate to break it to you, stomach, but that’s what I seem to be doing, anyway, even with the weekly weigh-ins.

In the end, I’ve decided to keep up with the weekly Progress Tracker, mostly because I’ve set up the blog this way and have sworn to do so.  And knowing that the four of you are reading on a semi-regular basis does help me, to some extent, feel accountable.  (Though I’ve had friends on Weight Watchers tell me that the weekly weigh-in, in front of others, acts as motivation to keep them on track during the week, that’s never really seemed to work for me. Unfortunately, I’ve found that I need to tap into motivation from within myself, rather than from an exterior source, to stay on any kind of healthy eating plan). 

So, I guess it’s back to an earlier principle, picking oneself right back up and starting all over again as if nothing has happened.  And I do believe I’m going to tag that as my second “What Actually Works” strategy. 

“Mum, we don’t care if your weight goes up.  We will still love you anyway. And if you decide to finally stop eating those Banana Oat bars, we’ll help get rid of the leftovers, no problem!”