Turkey Rice Vegetable Soup

It's another soup day here. . .

Yesterday I bought an almost 4# roasted turkey breast. This morning, I cut off a pound and waited for soup inspiration to happen. I started in the usual way by lightly browning the following aromatics and rice. This time in some ghee. I've made my own ghee a couple times, but haven't made our bought any recently. Then I bought a big tub of it yesterday.

4 stalks celery

1 giant carrot

1 sm. onion

1 lg. garlic clove

1 lg. purple shallot

2T ghee, butter or EVOO

3/4c golden rose brown rice

Sauté these together, stirring occasionally while prepping the vegetables listed below. After the first group has sautéed enough to need a cup or two of water, add the remaining ingredients below.

1 sm.-med. green cabbage 

1/2 lg. long-skinny red bell pepper

4 roma tomatoes - peeled* +

2-3T turkey Better Than Bouillon

1 bunch of beet greens sliced-chopped 

5-7c cold fresh water in total

Simmer gently, stir occasionally for another 20 minutes or until the rice is done the way you like it. . .Lin

*tomato skins contain flavonoids, which impart a bitter flavor. they don't break down in cooking so, to me, they add a sort of nasty plastic bag texture. additionally the skins are high in lectin, an undesirable protein that can create digestive issues and inflammation. it's so worth all this 'trouble' though, since the cooking process develops the lycopene in tomatoes. lycopene is a very beneficial antioxidant, similar to betacarotene, that can protect our cells from damage.

+Martha Stewart has the simplest video showing this process. If your tomatoes aren't ripe, you'll need to leave them in the rapidly boiling water just a little longer, maybe 20 seconds total.

Preparing Vegetables for Soup and Gazpacho

• tomatoes
• any color bell peppers
• 5 giant garlic cloves

Bring 2½ quarts of water to a rolling boil. Fill a big bowl of ice then add water. Drop the tomatoes, a couple at a time, into the boiling water for 10-12 seconds - stirring.

Immediately scoop them out with a slotted spoon and into the ice water. Stir and then leave them for several minutes to keep the flesh from cooking. Do this with the garlic, for the same amount of time and the whole peppers too, but the peppers will take about a minute or longer in the boiling water, to loosen their skins. Follow by immersing them in ice water also. Once the tomatoes and garlic are peeled, the peppers peeled and seeded, chop them well, into a big bowl. Add the other chopped, fresh ingredients. Celery, onions and green onion.

Drizzle with 2-3T EVOO and whatever seasonings will be best for your future recipes. I had 12 cups to freeze in 2c amounts, in each of 6 quart size bags.

Gazpacho

To what's left in the bowl, I added two 5-inch pickling cucumbers and blended it well to make a quart of fresh Gazpacho. I pour some in a bowl and heat it for 30 seconds in the microwave, just to take the chill off, then top with a dab of sour cream, a sprinkle of dill, avocado slices, and serve it with whole grain crisp bread.  

It is SO good! . .Lin