Loaded baked potato soup

I bought ten pounds of potatoes to make the clam chowder recipe.  I debated between buying five pounds vs ten pounds, but I knew I wanted to make Shepherd's Pie and this soup, which would also use potatoes so I bought the ten pound bag of potatoes.  I'm sure the fact that the ten pound bag was only 50 cents more than the five pound bag had nothing to do with my decision....  As it turns out, I also made loaded potato skins and will probably make seasoned potato wedges to finish off the bag.  I've gotten quite a lot of use out of all those potatoes!

Mike loves loaded baked potatoes.  Who wouldn't?  They usually have a lot of cheese, bacon, and sometimes other goodies.  This soup sounded like it would be pretty good, and the picture in the Comfort Food Makeovers book looks amazing with "big" chunks of crispy bacon.

This recipe also turned rather bland.  Again I used turkey bacon in this recipe (I had one package of turkey bacon and had to find many uses for it.  I ended up using the last of it in the Loaded Potato Skins.  Of course the next day Mike asked me if I had any more bacon since it he wanted to put it on his pizza.  I would've saved him some instead of using it all on the Loaded Potato Skins, but alas he made his request too late).  If I made this recipe again (which I don't plan to do), I would definitely use regular bacon.  The fat from the bacon is used to make crispy potato skins.  I feel that the turkey bacon didn't have enough fat left over in the pan.

The recipe called for Greek yogurt instead of sour cream, in order to be slightly healthier.  I went to the grocery store to buy Greek yogurt, and I thought I had bought plain Greek yogurt.  It wasn't until I had returned home and was putting the food away that I realized I had bought Pomegranate flavored Greek yogurt.  Yes, Pomegranate.  I didn't accentually buy Strawberry, Peach, Blueberry or some other flavor which I might have actually tried, I bought Pomegranate!

It's a lot harder to find plain Greek yogurt in small containers than one would think.  The grocery store sells big containers of plain Greek yogurt, but what would I do with such a large container of Greek yogurt?  They also sell many different flavors of Greek yogurt in the small containers, most of which were not plain.  I had to look very carefully to find what I thought was plain Greek yogurt.  I used sour cream in this recipe instead since I had that in the refrigerator and the recipe was trying to use Greek yogurt as a sub for sour cream anyway.

At the end, the recipe says to puree about half the soup mixture so that it will still have chunks of potatoes, but will also have a smooth texture.  I tried to puree about half the soup in the Vitamix, but I must have used more than half since the soup seemed a little light on potato chunks when I served it, but seemed very heavy on the potato chunks before I took out the soup mixture to make the puree.

New England Clam Chowder

I love New England Clam Chowder.  I tend to forget that there are actually two types.  I love the creamy goodness of the New England Clam Chowder.  It's much better than it's tomato based "cousin".  I'm sure it's not as healthy, but it's worth it for a good cup of clam chowder.

I've wanted to make my own clam chowder for a long time, since I love it so much, and the taste really does vary, depending on where you get the soup.  A while ago, I had tried to make it using the crock pot.  However, the recipe we used called for a specific amount of clams, and we weren't sure if that amount was the "dry weight", or with juice.  We ended up using double the amount of clams because we like clams, and it was supposedly the correct amount.  The soup turned out very clammy, and tasted terrible.

This soup was OK, but was rather bland, even after I added the salt and pepper (to taste) to it.  I bought a big can of clams from Costco (about 51 ounces) and weighed the clams/juice to get the amount specified in there recipe.  It could be that I did not get enough clams or juice, but I don't think that was the issue.

This recipe uses a small amount of bacon to get the "fat content" and smokey flavor without being too unhealthy.  I found the recipe in Comfort Food Makeovers, where the recipes for popular dishes are updated to be healthier than the original versions.  The problem may have been that I used turkey bacon instead of regular bacon.  As a result, the bacon probably didn't impart as much flavor, or have as much fat as the original dish created by the recipe writers.

I also wasn't sure what they meant by "instant potato flakes".  I bought instant mashed potatoes and used those instead.  However, I think I might have used too much instant mashed potatoes.  The potato flakes are supposed to thicken the soup, but it made it too thick.  If I had to make this recipe again, I would put half or even less of the instant mashed potatoes.

My quest for a good clam chowder recipe continues, as I don't think I would make this recipe again.  If I'm going to eat a soup that is rich and on the unhealthy side, it might as well taste good.

"Panera" Broccoli Cheddar Soup

I wasn't feeling well, and Mike wasn't 100% healthy either, so we wanted to have soup.  He loves Panera.  I don't understand why.  The food is ok, but the portions are so small for the price that have to pay for the food.  He wanted to get Broccoli Cheddar soup from Panera; I said that I would try to make it at home.  The fact that I had a Broccoli crown that needed to be eaten in my refrigerator did not impact this decision at all.

I found a "copycat" recipe for Panera Broccoli Cheddar Soup, where I had most of the ingredients.  I didn't have the carrots, but I figured they were more healthy and tasty.  If I liked this recipe I could get carrots next time.

Mike said that he really liked the soup.  I felt that the broccoli was not as soft/tender as I would have expected.  I would throw in the broccoli earlier next time.  I think I also halved the amount of onion, since I don't like onions very much.