Tag: ginger

Winter Warming Ginger Tomato Soup

Ginger Tomato Soup

This is one of my favourite soups in the winter. It’s fresh and gingery, a little spicy and very hearty. For a more brothy, soupy soup, you can reduce the amount of barley to 1/2 cup. The introduction of either chipotle pepper (a smoked pepper), or smoked paprika gives it a rich, rounded flavour. Fresh ginger gives a bit of a bite, but also a slight citrusy flavour that cannot be replicated with dried ginger.

Feel free to add in any random veggies, or leftover stuff in the fridge (within reason). This kind of soup can be a great ‘use it up’ meal!

Ingredients:

  • 1-2 tsp oil
  • 1 medium onion, roughly chopped
  • 2 stalks of celery, chopped (plus some of the celery leaves, if you like)
  • 6 medium mushrooms, halved or quartered (depending on size and preference)
  • 1-2 medium carrots, cut into thick slices
  • 1-2 large potatoes, cut into big chunks
  • 2tbsp fresh grated ginger (dried will be quite different, so I do not recommend it)
  • 2 cloves of garlic, pressed or finely chopped
  • 1 tsp chipotle pepper, powdered (if you don’t want spicy, you can use smoked paprika instead)
  • 1 cup corn kernels (can use fresh, frozen or canned)
  • 1 796 ml can of diced tomatoes
  • 4+ cups of broth (a lightly flavoured one, like vegetarian or chicken, can substitute with water if needed)
  • 1/2 cup of chopped fresh parsley
  • 1 cup of barley, dried
  • salt & pepper, to taste

Instructions:

  1. Heat oil in a pot on medium heat.
  2. Once heated, add onion and celery. Cook until golden and soft – can add a tablespoon or so of broth or water to help with this. Be sure to cook off any extra liquid before the next step.
  3. Add the mushrooms, and saute until soft and lightly browned.
  4. Add the carrots, potatoes, ginger, garlic and chipotle (or paprika). Stir, and cook for a couple of minutes.
  5. Add the corn. If you’re using frozen or cold corn, cook until the corn warms up a little.
  6. Add the diced tomatoes.
  7. Add 4 cups of broth (or water). Make sure the liquid covers the vegetables completely. Add more broth or water if necessary.
  8. Cover. Let this cook for about 20 minutes on low heat.
  9. Add the barley. Cover, and cook for 30 minutes, or until barley is cooked through. Stir occasionally, and check to make sure everything is still covered in broth. Add more broth or water as needed.
  10. Add the chopped parsley and chopped peppers. Cook for another 10 minutes.
  11. Add salt and pepper, to taste.

Snake Oil & Ginger Juice

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Come up to the front of the stage – yes you! I have a cure for the common cold that will drive you wild!

OK, so I haven’t actually found a cure for the common cold, and I’m not charismatic enough to be a snake oil salesman. I have, however, come up with a sweet and spicy concoction that can help to soothe sore throats, loosen chest congestion a little… and all without chemicals or drugs.

Let me back this up a bit.

For a while now, I’ve been trying to slowly change parts of my life that are wasteful and I’ve been trying to weed out foods that aren’t healthy, or are full of chemicals or… just aren’t food. Here in Canada, many of us reach for a packet of Neo Citran when we feel the effects of a cold (yes, fellow Canadians, you will get strange looks if you ask for it in the USA). I’ve always liked it, but it’s also creeped me out. It’s a weirdly lemon-pledgey powdered mixture that tastes like there’s a ground up aspirin in it (because there kind of IS one).

Add to that, the fact that the acetaminophen in it doesn’t mix with other cold medications I may take.

I decided to make my own hot lemony drink. I know I’m not the only one, and I’m sure many others have magically come up with the same concoction that I use. I know this must be true, because of its simplicity — there are but four ingredients: water, grated fresh ginger, honey and freshly squeezed lemon.

The result is a sweet, spicy and lemony hot drink that is very soothing.

Get yourself a really big piece of fresh ginger – the chubbier the better, and look for a smooth skin with some shine to it — if it is wrinkly and dull, it is old and not as useful.

Ingredients:

  • 1/2 c of grated fresh ginger
  • 2tbsp honey (this is a good way to use up any honey that has started to crystallize)
  • 1-3 tbsp fresh lemon juice
  • 1/2 c water

I’ve made this a couple of different ways now, and we’ve found a method that seems to work well, except that I’m not sure if boiling the crap out of ginger will kill some of the good-for-you properties of it. I need to figure this out, but am not a scientician.

Here’s how I’ve been making it up lately:

  1. Grate the ginger into a bowl, trying to keep as much of the liquid as possible.
  2. Put the ginger and water into a pot on the stove, and simmer it for about 1/2 hour.
  3. Strain the mixture through a fine mesh colander/strainer, pressing on the pulp of the ginger to get more liquid out. Get as much of the liquid out as you can.
  4. Put the strained mixture back on the stove. The liquid should be opaque and a brownish colour. If the mixture is too transparent or light in colour, put the stove on high and boil off some of the water. Taste it – it should be a very very strong, bitter, gingery taste. It should taste terrible.
  5. Once you have the perfect awful ginger juice, turn the stove down to a low-med temperature. Add the honey, and make sure it dissolves completely.
  6. Add the lemon juice, stir it in. Take the mixture off of the stove now, and let it cool. Put it in a container in the fridge, where you can access it as needed.

To drink: Put 3 tbsp of the ginger mixture into a mug, top with hot/boiling water (doesn’t need to be boiling, as it doesn’t need to steep). Ejoy!