A Bowl of Potato Corn Chowder and Pondering What Not to Wear

I had known about this trip for months. Five months to be exact. Five months to pack, go to the grocery store, make carpool arrangements, buy Birthday presents. Five months to figure out why the fan on my laptop runs continuously when I use it. But here it was t-minus three days and I had yet to do any of that.

In an effort to solve the laptop problem, I decided that I needed to remove photos off the hard drive. Which lead me to an investigation of where certain photo files were before I started the deletion process. Since I have photos backed up to two external hard drives, a few random thumb drives and the hard drives of a laptop and a desktop, it's sometimes difficult to know just where I put those bloomin' files.

Before long, I was overwhelmed by the investigation and instead found myself identifying "4923 unknown faces" in iPhoto's faces feature...3 at a time. This lead to a form of motion sickness and I turned the job over to the 6-year-old who can now read and gets joy from mouse clicks.

As I gave up my chair to my young child and turned to go, the stacks, bags and boxes of "printed" photos caught my eye. Maybe there were hard copies of the missing files? And before I could stop myself, I was immersed in the mission of sorting through and organizing TEN years worth of photos. For TEN YEARS many of these photos had been sitting in non-descript bags without thought and yet here, three days before leaving my family to go across the country on a trip that has NOTHING to do with those photos, I suddenly found an urgent calling to organize them. (Let's just say, it was a 2 a.m.-er.)

The next morning, sleep-deprived and in a complete fog, I dragged myself to our local "caffeinating-hole," where I confessed my lunacy to two friends. They empathized. They had "been there, done that." But why? Why do we feel the need to organize the spice drawer, clean out the pantry, scrub the fridge with a toothbrush or organize 10-years worth of photos right before we leave on a trip?

Nesting...we decided. We want our nest in order before we leave.

And so, across the country and back again I went.* And when I returned, I hugged my sweet chickens, kissed the Rooster and heaved a sigh of relief. Glad to be home safely. Back in my nest.

Once the homecoming festivities had quieted down, I warmed up a bowl of leftover Potato Corn Chowder, (Goodness knows I didn't eat on the plane.)(Seriously? They can't even afford a bag of pretzels??) snuck into my little office and admired the shelf of newly labeled photo boxes.

Between each bite of my creamy, herbed soup, I flipped through the boxes, smiling, making note of the passing years and some lessons to be learned from them.

Of course, the biggest lesson of all is: Childhood goes fast. A blink of an eye.

Even though I feel like this was yesterday, the little girl here will be headed to high school in the fall. The little boy...middle school. And the toothy baby, a grown-up first grader. (Sigh....)

A close second to the above lesson is: Be careful what you wear and how you actually allow yourself to be photographed. These decisions can come back to haunt you. Let me give you a few examples of this so you may be spared my pain.

Let this be a warning to all of you first-time pregnant Mama's in your third trimester who feel frumpy and thick and want to cut your hair off. Don't do it. Just look at the picture. Need I say more.

No matter how cute the matching Mother and Child photos are in the catalog, this does not necessarily compute to real life. Actually, as you see here, it does not compute at all.

"Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it." 

Sometimes as a mother, no matter how much they beg you to play, it's just best to say no.

And finally, when asked my number one tip for taking beautiful photographs...never use a flash. Never, ever, ever. Never. Perhaps I should heed my own advice.

The soup bowl was empty. My eyelids were growing heavy. The photographs had been flipped through. The lessons learned. (Or at least acknowledged.) And admiring my boxes of photographs once again, I was glad I had stayed up until the wee hours to organize them.

Sometimes as a mother, when everything is a top priority, it takes that nesting instinct to get these seemingly unimportant projects done. And yet, spending the time, flipping through the years, smiling and watching my children grow-up before my eyes was anything but unimportant.

Potato Corn Chowder

While there are places in the world enjoying sunny days and short sleeve temperatures, this place, my hometown, is not one of them. We are still in the "spring showers" phase. Still carrying around umbrellas and donning our down jackets. Curling up with a bowl of soup continues to be part of our routine. This soup is perfect for spring. It takes advantage of the baby potatoes, leeks and herbs that are currently in-season. Throw in a little frozen corn and some crispy bacon and you've got a bowl of soup no one can resist.

Ingredients
2 tbsp olive oil
3 leeks, white and light green parts, chopped
4 garlic cloves, minced
3 lbs of thin-skinned, yellow potatoes, diced (approx 10 cups)
8 c chicken broth
1 tbsp fresh thyme
2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp freshly ground pepper
2 c frozen sweet corn
1/2 c half-and-half (or at least, 2% milk)

Toppings
6 slices bacon, cooked crisp and crumbled
Parmesan cheese, freshly grated
1/4 c fresh Italian parsley, chopped

Directions
In a large soup pot, heat your olive oil over medium heat. Add your leeks and sauté for about 8-10 minutes over medium-low heat until they are softened and almost transluscent. Careful not to burn them. Turn your heat down if they are browning too quickly.

Add in your garlic and sauté another minute.

Add your potatoes to the pot and pour in your chicken stock. Add your thyme, salt and pepper. Put the lid on and bring to a boil. Reduce your heat to medium-low. With the lid askew, simmer for about 12-14 minutes or until your potatoes are just soft when pricked with a fork.

Add in your corn and simmer another 3-5 minutes.

Remove soup from heat. Stir in your half-and-half.

Lay out your toppings. Ladle the soup into bowls. Sprinkle a little of this and a little of that on top.

Then, take your bowl over to the window and watch the rain fall while daydreaming of sunnier places.


Yield: One big pot-full


*In case you were curious as to where I went...I traveled to Atlanta, Georgia last week for the BlogHerFood Conference. As you can imagine, we ate, talked and breathed food. I can't say enough good things about the trip. The women (and men) in the food world are truly amazing people. While I did not even take one picture, my friend (and roommate) Sandy Coughlin of Reluctant Entertainer wrote up a great post about the event (including more incriminating photos of me...clearly I'll never learn) which you can read by clicking here.


...


Organizing Project
A bit of a detour. See above. :)




All original text and photographs copyright: Carrie Minns 2009-2011

Roasted Red Pepper and Tomato Mexican Soup...the Perfect Meal at the End of a Long Ride Down the Highway

On a highway. In the middle of Mt. Hood National Forest. Our car was in park. The engine off. And even though there was a line of cars behind us, as far as I could see, in the same predicament, it was strangely quiet. Dark. The snow gently falling all around us. Those big luscious feather-like flakes. I thought about how a little over 10 years ago I was parked here as well. Going the other direction. My 11-year old was a baby and we had just rung in the 2000 New Year. I was in a panic about whether to take him out of his car seat to nurse him. Never sure when the line of cars would start moving again. I sang Raffi songs for the hours we were parked on the highway to entertain his sister because that was back when I was even more of a glutton for punishment than I am now. Back when I thought children should not have electronic devices in the car but instead, should gaze out the window and let their imaginations run wild. As I looked at my three children, now, lit up by the glow of the movie they were watching...with headphones...in the quiet, quiet car, I thought, "Thank goodness, I came to my senses."

We were headed to Sunriver in Central Oregon. Our yearly destination for Thanksgiving. Nana and Papa, aunts and uncles and a gaggle of cousins were waiting for our arrival. But here we were, stopped on this oft-traveled highway. A highway that was a means to an end. A highway I'd traveled on my entire life. A highway that was like an old-time movie. Little bits of memory from my life flickered by in my mind as we made our way down the road. The spot I handed off the baton on my one and only Hood to Coast race. The little church in which I sang "One Hand, One Heart" at the bride's request. (Poor thing should have had me stick to just playing the piano.) The end of the Glade trail. Our back door way to get off the mountain from all-night New Year's Eve skiing. The turn-off for Timothy Lake where we survived the Dust Bowl '03 camping trip which rendered our children so covered in dirt, they looked like extras from the set of Grapes of Wrath.

A few hours later, a few more miles down the road, we're stopped again. I'm under the car dealing with chains and cursing myself for not taking the forecast for snow more seriously. My hands are covered in grease. I think of the times, as a teenager, I had to put chains on our Toyota and how often I had put them on the wrong tires....front instead of back. Or was it back instead of front? Not far from here was the road marker I somehow backed into and blew out the back window of our car in 100 degree weather. Not sure what to do about it in the middle of nowhere, I kept driving. The cat howling. The eldest children, preschoolers at the time, crying. My sweetie still raises an eyebrow no matter how many times I say to him, "Cross my heart, hope to die, I never saw a road marker. It came out of nowhere."

Moving again, we pass the turn-off for the short-cut into Maupin. Where I hit a rabbit. At 1 in the morning. In my '73 VW Bug. Back when my sweetie and I were newlyweds. I'm still sad about that rabbit.

On and on down the road we go, and on and on plays the grainy film of my life.

A week later, the 10 hour drive and Thanksgiving behind us, we strike out onto the highway again. Headed for home. This time we opt for the more southern pass but the same grainy movie plays as we drive. Sisters Coffee Company we stumbled upon last summer. Camping under the stars and fly-fishing in Camp Sherman back in college. Driving a golf cart around Black Butte Ranch back in high school. Wondering if that rope swing stills hangs there on the edge of Suttle Lake all these years later?

I felt as if I was in an old silent movie house as these little scenes played out. Only the sound of the clicking of the film, as it went round and round the reel, could be heard. It made me think that this is how life works. We keep driving down the highway and life happens. Scenes are filmed.

The snow gave way to rain signaling that we were almost home. We pull into our driveway, just in time for me to make dinner, and go inside. It takes me awhile to shake the feeling that I'd just left a dark movie house and stepped out into bright light. The film wound down. The clicks coming more and more slowly, as I pulled ingredients from the pantry to whip up a quick Tomato and Red Pepper soup. By the time I sat the bowls down, sprinkled with sharp cheddar, tortilla chips and cilantro, the movie was over. I was back to creating new scenes. Scenes that would eventually be sliced into the grainy film of my life played out again on some long, snowy drive down a highway.


Roasted Red Pepper and Tomato Mexican Soup
Passed on to me by my sis

This recipe is so so fast. A great one to keep handy as you're getting ready for the holidays and don't have much time to cook. The salsa you decide to use can really change the flavor of this soup. The last time I made this soup, I found a tub of salsa in the back of my fridge crying to be used. It happened to be a fresh, medium salsa made by Whole Foods. Was perfect. I served it with some homemade guacamole and sliced pears because that's what I had in the house, but you could also whip up a little green salad or just serve it as is. For a vegetarian version, simply omit the chicken.

Ingredients:

2 tbsp olive oil
1 yellow onion, diced
4 cloves of garlic, minced
2 boxes (32 oz.) of Roasted Red Pepper and Tomato Soup (I've found this at Trader Joe's and my local grocery store.)
1 can of corn or 1 small bag of frozen corn
2 c salsa
2 c (approx) chicken breasts, grilled, poached*, leftover from a roasted chicken OR 1 lg can of white chicken

Possible toppings:
grated, sharp cheddar cheese
tortillas strips or crushed tortilla chips
chopped cilantro

Directions:

Heat your olive oil in a heavy-bottomed soup pot. Add your onions and garlic and saute for about 5-10 minutes or until your onions soften and start to become translucent. Pour in your roasted red pepper and tomato soup. Add your corn, salsa and chicken. Bring to a boil. Then, turn down the heat, simmer, serve.

Ladle into bowls and top with cheese, chips and cilantro, if you'd like. Enjoy.

*The last time I made this soup, I poached a couple of boneless skinless breasts and they were delicious in this soup. Basically, I sprinkled my chicken with salt and pepper and put them in a small pan. I covered them with some chicken stock that I needed to use up but you could use water or a combo of the two. Sprinkled in a teaspoon or so of Herbes de Provence. Tossed in a bay leaf. Put the lid on. Brought it to a boil. Then, lowered the heat and simmered with the lid on for 15 minutes. The chicken was cooking while I put together the rest of the soup. The timing came out perfectly.

Yield: One big pot-full


Conclusion to the Turkey Saga.....
In case you were curious about my turkey dilemma, I thought I would let you know that I survived. I ended up going my own route and had the turkey cut up into pieces before we left town. I gave it a salt rub the night before. Then, pulled it out of the fridge for 45 min before roasting. Rubbed it with butter, more salt and pepper. Surrounded it with herbs from my garden (rosemary, sage, Italian parsely, oregano) and garlic cloves still in their "paper". Then, put it in the oven at 425 degrees for an hour and a half. Smelled delicious and tasted delicious. The only thing I would do differently next time is check the temperature of the meat at about the one hour mark since the breast were done a little more than I prefer. All in all, I'd say it was a success. But, if I may be completely honest with you....here's what I learned through this entire process: Call me crazy but I don't even really like roasted turkey. Where's the grilled salmon? I just don't feel the turkey love.


Calendar Update....
My Etsy shop where you will be able to purchase the 2011 La Pomme de Portland calendar, should be up and running later today. I will send out an official announcement tomorrow. Thank you so much to those of you who have sent emails and so forth letting me know you'll be ordering one or two or...six. I am so excited about this project and the thought of helping out two great organizations. Cheers!



All original text and photographs copyright: Carrie Minns 2009-2010