Soups week 3

This week, I will talk about some basic ingredients that are used in soups. I suppose that the basic ingredients in soups can be broken down into 3 categories: vegetables, meats, and seafood. The one category of ingredients that is used in just about any soup is vegetables. Vegetables are the staple ingredients in most soups. Even most meat soups have some sort of vegetables in it. The 3 basic vegetables that are included in virtually every soup (or at least can be) are carrots, onions, and celery. I would say that I use these 3 vegetables in 85-90% of the soups that I make, and I start all the soups by dicing these 3 vegetables up fine, and sautéing them in the bottom of the stock pot in which I am making my soups, and then also adding whatever the main ingredient of the soup is going to be into the pot right on top of the initial 3 vegetables. You could even be fancy, and call this fine dice of vegetables "mirepoix", which is a French word which means "To tell you the truth I don't know what it means". Basically, it is one of the basics of flavoring for the soups, which is not to say that all soups taste the same because they are always involved, but it is a good start to a flavorful soup. As far as using vegetables as the main ingredient for soup, you can use basically any vegetable that you want as the main ingredient. Don't be afraid to try anything, if you like celery, try celery. The same goes for meats. Although a high percentage of meat soups use ground beef, basically any meat can be used. This includes poultry and game in this category, the only thing that I would suggest about this is to keep whatever the meat is low cost. There is no need to use filet mignon quality beef for a soup, it's just not cost effective. Seafood is also a good choice for soups. Besides the basic fish or clam chowder, there are other variations of fish style soups that can be made. With all of these categories of main ingredients, there is only one general rule that I would recommend. Use the same type stock as the main ingredient is going to be. Use fish stock for seafood soups, or at least clam juice. Same goes for meat and vegetables.

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