Jan. Week 1 Smashed potato soup

Smashed Potato Soup -- This was supposed to be a variation of a crispy smashed potato that I saw on the food network and potato soup. I really dislike potato soups that are mushy so I wanted to make sure what I made was chunky and I thought the smashed potatoes were an interesting twist. It failed for the original concept, but sailed for the overall taste and what it ended up being in the end. I'm going to post the recipe for the original concept -- it will be made again, oh yes it will hehe.

Equipment:

Stockpot (used my 12-qt for the potatoes and then the 5-qt for the soup itself)
Good cutting board -- will need both sides; one for meat, one for veggies
Good knife
whisk
bench scrapper (optional but I used one lol)

Crispy Potatoes

1 lb new potatoes

Cook: Boil potatoes until fork tender. Take out and let cook slightly. On a clean cutting board individually press down on each potato until it just smashes. Crisp up in a frying pan with a smudge of olive oil

* I learned that red skin and new are NOT the same thing and so this is where the soup ended in a failure for the concept lol*

Soup

Rue:

3 T butter
3 T flour
1.5 C milk

Other ingredients

1 heart of celery chopped (I even used the leaves)
2 carrots
3/4 C chopped onions (I used red)
1 kielbasa
1/2 lb bacon -- oven cooked and then crumbled in towards the end)
basil, thyme, oregano, salt and pepper to taste

Cook:

While the potatoes are boiling. Start the rue by melting the butter in the smaller stockpot, add the flour and once combined for a few minutes add the milk while whisking to combine completely. Once combined add the herbs. Leave this to simmer and thicken slightly while working on the rest of the ingredients

Chop up the celery into smaller bite size pieces -- you actually do want to see them -- and throw into the pot

Peel and chop carrots and throw in the pot

Flip the cutting board and cut the kielbasa into small bite size rounds -- no need to quarter or anything else -- throw in pot

Once the potatoes are out -- if using the redskin like I did, I just smashed them with the bottom of a plate and tossed them in so it was chunky

Let cook together for approximately an hour on the stove top -- set at a simmer you don't want it to boil at this point.

before dishing up crumble bacon into it and stir in. Dish out into lunch dishes and pop into the fridge -- or if serving right away do as normal

** This does turn out really thick so ass more milk if you want more of a basic soup than more of a stew