Soup comes off the back burner for fall
The Steamboat Pilot & Today featured a great story on fall recipes. Enjoy our special Red Bean & Beef Chili...it truly is a football watching must! If you don't have time to cook this yourself swing into the Drunken Onion for an already prepared delight!
As fall rolls into Steamboat Springs, the leaves are not the only things changing - lower temperatures also are shifting people's palates.
"It's almost automatic - the temperature hits 60 degrees, and people want soup," chef Ben Stroock said Friday, whipping up his red bean and beef chili in the kitchen of The Drunken Onion. "The colder the day, the more we put on."
"People aren't really into consommés this time of year," said Nancy Kramer, program coordinator for Northwest Colorado Products. "They're into hearty soups, clear soups and chowder in the fall."
"We'll get into some squash soups, pork green chili and probably some more chowders," Stroock said of his grab-and-go restaurant's planned expanded offerings.
Cooking tips
While Stroock readily admits he tends to make soups in considerably larger batches - 5 gallons in an industrial tilt skillet - than the average kitchen cook, some helpful hints make for better flavor, no matter the proportions.
"I add the dry spices before the liquid," Stroock said. "If you hit them with the vegetables and the oils, it kind of brings them back to life, as opposing to just boiling them with the stock."
For his chili, Stroock stirred his spices, including cumin and chili powder, into the sautéing vegetables, filling them with the complex flavors before adding in the meat, beans and sauce.
"You can smell how these just build up as they heat up," Stroock said.
For the many soups and broths with beans, budding chefs may find it easier to cook their beans separately, rather than boiling the dry beans in the soup itself, he said. Stroock uses canned red beans in his chili.
"It's too much of a pain to balance getting all of them cooked, without using all of your water," Stroock said.
There also is no shame in using canned ingredients, especially tomatoes.
"Canned tomatoes are canned when the tomatoes are at their absolute best, when they've got too many, too ripe, and they've got to get rid of them," Stroock said. "For consistency, you can't beat canned tomatoes."
Seasonal favorites
Although butternut squash soup is a common go-to fall dish, a host of other winter squashes already are available in Steamboat.
In addition to pumpkins, acorn, buttercup and Hubbard squashes arrived for the season earlier this month, said Katherine Zambrana of Sweet Pea Market.
The Yampa Valley's long, wet winter pushed back the arrival of some fall favorites. However, it's a tradeoff for local foodies, as the corresponding belated arrival of summer fruits means good peaches should be found on Steamboat's shelves until early November, Zambrana said.
"Everything's a little delayed this year," Zambrana said.
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