the id, the ego, & the single misfiring brain cell

today's cooking adventure: vegan mushroom and barley soup

As you may know by now, my culinary urges are invariably inspired by chance encounters. This one came from my discovery of this wonderful dish at the University Memorial Center yesterday. I'd never heard of mushroom barley soup, but...doesn't it sound fabulous?

It is.

First step for creating your own dish: Read several recipes for similar dishes. You'll discover some perfect ingredients suggested in one that aren't extant in others. Write them down. The most influential recipes I discovered for today's piece de resistance were Vegetarian Mushroom Barley Soup at Vegetarian Lifestyle and  Firstborn Mushroom and Onion Soup at vegweb.

Step two: Go shopping. Take the recipes with you as you shop, because a good dish derives not just from the slow and deliberate physical combination of ingredients, but from the prior mental digestion of possibilities. If you take the recipes with you, the ideas will simmer as you shop.

The recipe I'm using as my baseline here is the first. I'm going to tweak it, though, so just glance at it now so you know what I'm doing. At the end of this, I'll give you my entire creation, with measurements and everything.

Step three: Start soaking your barley immediately. It needs about two hours. (If you're ready to start cooking before then, no worries. You'll just need to cook longer.)

Step four: Before you go a step farther, please clean that filthy kitchen. I swear sometimes that you were raised in a barn.

Step five: Print the preferred recipe, then take it to the kitchen with a pencil or pen. You'll never forgive yourself if you don't write down what you did, because this dish will be amazing and you don't want to forget any of the perfecto ingredients (or their measurements).

Step six: Clean and drain all your fresh produce. I usually would recommend a sink full of cold water with a slosh of white vinegar in it. At any rate, go ahead and clean the stuff thoroughly (but gently, with the mushrooms!) and leave them out to dry.

Step seven: Put on some good music and chop stuff up (or "fun with knives").

By the way...I don't know if you've noticed this, but the music you're listening to as you create this dish influences its outcome, just as it would influence any other work of art.

For example, when I listen to hard rock, I throw in a lot more red pepper than necessary (which can be a bit of surprise if I'm cooking a cake). Listening to classical while cooking produces a tendency to oversalt your food, because classical blands things down. Country just makes me want to put A1 Sauce on everything, for some reason.

For the music today, I'm listening to Jamento. The artist is Александр Сякин, and the album (in case you want to check it out) is Потерявшиеся во времени. It's instrumental (so it isn't distracting), upbeat and delightfully weird.

You're going to need to chop....wait. First, for those of you who don't chop well or who simply hate it, I have three suggestions:

One: For the love of all that's pure and holy, use the right tool. For chopping, use a chopping knife. (If you think that term is redundant, you're exactly the person I'm talking to.) Do not use a steak knife to chop onions; a steak knife is for steak (hence the name--they tried to make the distinction easy for you, see).

Two: Sharpen your knife. (If you don't have a sharpening stone, you can use a coffee mug. I just tried this and it works quite well.)

Three: Use the right technique.

For example, today I'll need some chopped onions. Here is a brilliant, easy, non-tear-inducing technique I've been using with perfect results over a year, having accidentally discovered it on youtube.* Check it out. It will change your life.

* Because, let's face it: I knew how to chop vegetables. :roll: Pish.

For the carrots, use this technique. For the celery, this one (similar to the carrots, but with a distinct difference). Since I'm adding one red bell pepper to the recipe, here is a cool technique for cleaning/chopping it. Of course, you'll need sliced mushrooms.

Go ahead and put all your chopped onions, carrots, and celery (and red pepper) into the same bowl. Put the chopped mushrooms in a different one.

Step eight: Time to make some magic. Here's my working recipe:

4 packages of whole mushrooms, cleaned and chopped. (I used 2 pkgs of the regular white ones and 2 pkgs of small portabellos.)

1 lb bag of pearl barley, soaked, rinsed and drained (I had to ask where the grocery store hides this; at Safeway, it's nestled in there with the rice and beans.)

1.5 - 2 cups of chopped carrots (and I highly recommend using the old-fashioned type, for two reasons: you can clean them but leave the skin on, which adds untold* nutrients to your dish, and because chopping those faux baby carrots is a pain in the tukus.)

* At least, while "everybody knows" that the skin of the carrot is the most nutritional part, no one has ever told me what nutrients you get from it, or how many.

1.5 - 2 cups of chopped celery

1 chopped bell pepper (I selected a red one. I have no idea why. A green one would have been cheaper and added a nicer variety of color.)

2 lg onions, chopped

3 quarts of veggie broth (if you don't have my dietary restrictions, I'm told beef or chicken broth is amazing)

roughly a cup of butter product (I used Smart Balance) or olive oil*

* Since you're going to cook with it, use the cheapest kind. Don't waste your extra virgin on this; save her for something special.

salt to taste (I'm a saltaholic, so I put in about 3 tablespoons)

~3 tsp coarsely ground black pepper

~2 tsp thyme

3-4 tablespoons of minced garlic

4 tablespoons minced dill

3 tablespoons dried, chopped parsley

1/2 cup soy sauce

1 cup dry white wine

4-5 tablespoons chopped lemon grass and juices

5-6 tablespoons crushed red peppers

Awright. Let's cook!

In a huge honking pot (or two of the biggest you have, if you're making as much of this as I am and have been putting off buying that witch's cauldron), melt your butter over a low flame. (Yeah, baby.) Pour in onions, carrots, celery, garlic, and red bell pepper (or whatever firmer veggies you feel inclined to include). Saute until tender (3-5 minutes, stirring occasionally, should do it).

Add all those wonderful funguses. Stir them in a bit. Cook until just soft (about 3 minutes, tops).

Add the broth, barley, wine, soy sauce, lemon grass, and all seasonings except for the dill and parsley. Bring to a boil, then simmer for about thirty minutes. (If your barley didn't get the whole 2 hour soak, you'll need to compensate for your impatience now.)

When it's otherwise done, add the dill and parsley.

Serve.

If it sucks, I apologize in advance. I told you it was an experiment. ;)

If it suffers from anything, it's probably from being "too busy." I'm working on being less busy.

d