green soup

I had to laugh yesterday - the woman behind me in the grocery checkout line made a comment about how healthy my groceries looked as she sheepishly put a giant box of delicious looking cinnamon buns on the conveyor. I told her she was just seeing the produce part of my order - the not so healthy stuff was already bagged. Also, I bought the biggest bunch of chard I've seen at this store, it was easily 10 times the size of the rest of the bunches (and I did check that it wasn't many bunches stuck together). Which brings me to the green soup. We've been eating our fair amount of green lately - mainly broccoli - but I had lots of spinach and a bunch of kale sitting in the veggie drawer the other night and after a heavyish chinese food lunch I needed some green so I made green soup. It was inspired by this.

 Here's how I made it:

Green Soup (inspired by Ree)

1 bunch of spinach

1 bunch of kale, cut into ribbons

Saute the spinach and kale in a saute pan until wilted. Set aside.

1/4 c butter

1/4 c flour

3 1/3 c stock (chicken or vegetable, I used a mix)

2/3 c milk

2 tsp dijon mustard

1/8 tsp dry mustard

pinch of nutmeg

1/2 cup finely grated gruyere cheese plus more for the table

splash of cream

In the saute pan, melt the butter. Add the flour, milk, stock, mustards and whisk well to mix. Heat until bubbles form and then simmer for 5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper and a grating of nutmeg.

Add back the spinach and kale and blend into the soup using an immersion blender until the texture is what you like. Add some of the cheese and a splash of cream and stir until blended.

Serve with a pinch of the cheese.