Day 54 - Shrimp and Sweet Corn Chowder

Recipe from Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution

Hi everyone! Caleb, thanks for cooking for us yesterday. Yesterday I had to go to the doctor, then we were only home for about 30 minutes, then we had to straight to piano lessons, and my parents had to go to back to school night, and so while Jared and I were gone at piano, my mom and Caleb made dinner.

I was glad. I was very glad. You probably saw the pictures of Caleb.

Tonight, dramatic pause, I was in the kitchen once again.

Last night I didn't get much sleep, and I was very tired, so I was going for an easy recipe. This chowder was quite easy, but my grammy's chowder is really good, too. But hers is clam chowder heaven. This had shrimp in it. Jared, my fellow cooker, cut the potatoes WAY TOO BIG. It took about 20 extra minutes to cook because of that than it was normally supposed to.

We used onion instead of leeks because we didn't have leeks, and we've never had leeks. I've never had leeks, which explains why I don't know what they are. Jamie Oliver has everything which is why he uses things like leeks.

It was very good with onions.

This was really fun. I got a knife and corn cob and went zing zing zing and sliced the corn off the cob.

Although you could use frozen corn, but we didn't want to use frozen corn because we had fresh and didn't want to waste that, so we used it.

It also had shrimp in it. That's why it's called what it's called. You buy the shrimp at the store and then take off the shell of the shirmp.

You finely chop the potatoes and onions (which my brother did not do), and then you saute them in a pan and then you add the corn and shrimp, then the broth and cream.

You let that simmer, and then you crumble crackers, bacon (which we didn't have), so we used ham, which is really, really good also. We cooked the ham to make it crunchy like bacon.

1 1/2 THUMBS UP, and a special shout out to Grandpa! Sophie loves you, Grandpa! Happy Birthday. Jared says he loves you, too!

Day 46 - Cauliflower and Cheese Soup

Cookbook - Jamie's Food Revolution

Cauliflower. Not something that sounds super-duper appetizing.

Think again, my little friend. It is actually quite good...if you know how to cook it. And Jamie Oliver does know how to cook it because he's, like, a cooking genius.

So today, as you might have guessed, I made something with cauliflower. I made Cauliflower and Cheese soup, to be precise. Now you must be thinking, "Boy, they must just buy cauliflower for their health!"

Although it might seem like that, that's actually quite a pitiful guess for we only had the cauliflower for one reason. We recently, like today, joined a fruit and veggie co-op. My mother came home today with a whole boatload of fresh fruits and veggies. Where'd did she get them? Can you figure it out? Yep, the co-op.

And there, out of the blue, a surprise sprang...a head of cauliflower!

**Gasp!**

And so I thought to myself, "What is cauliflower doing here?" I soon figured out that we had to make a dish with cauliflower tonight. This had to be done in between my piano lesson (I've been playing for 7 years, just FYI), band registration night, and 4-H (which is a group which has a lot of activities and things to do, including cooking). In all, including eating, we had about 35 minutes to make this.

All I did was get garlic, carrots, cauliflower, onion, celery (which we didn't have). Chop, chop, chop it.

Saute it in olive oil.

Meanwhile bring chicken (or veggie) to a boil. Once the veggies are soft, add them to the broth. I covered and cooked it for about 10 minutes, then I used a hand blender and blended it. I added cheese, nutmeg, salt and pepper, and dried mustard.

Ladle it into a bowl. I think it tasted good with sausage bread. It wasn't disgusting like you may think cauliflower would be. I think that cauliflower is a veggie that has a majorly wrong stereotype.

I liked the soup so I give it 1 1/2 THUMBS UP. So did Sophie.

This is the salad Sophie and my mother made to go with our soup.

Not bad for 35 minutes.