Cheesy Potato Broccoli Soup (Still Good on a Hot Day)

So I am one of those people who thinks that any day is a great day to eat soup! So what if it is 80 degrees out. I play the game of “what kind of meal would you never get sick of if you had to eat it over and over again?”, and for me it is soup, salad and hopefully home made bread. Now we got completely lucky yesterday because just as I was packing up some soup to take to Benji and Tionna and the babies, Casey stopped over to give us the most delicious home made garlic hummus. I just happened to have cut up cucumbers and peppers with nothing to dip them in! Can’t get better than that.

Anyway, I bought another bag full of Birdsong Farm new potatoes last weekend at the Farmer’s Market after we picked up our CSA box. We were having so much company that I wanted to make sure that we had enough potatoes and enough peas for everyone. I ended up having about 6 potatoes left that I had not served. Hence this soup. Also, One of our granddaughters can’t eat cheese right now so I just left it out for her portion. I tasted it without the cheese and it was still good! Not as good as with the cheese, but isn’t almost any dish better with cheese? You don’t have to use the good Cabot white cheddar, but you should if you can. The recipe is from a brochure that we got a long time ago when we visited the Cabot Creamery Cooperative in Montpelier, Vermont. You get to eat lots of samples there, and they are all good. I also recommend serving fruit salad with this if you can. Raspberries courtesy of Walnut Drive Garden.

Broccoli-Cheddar Soup

Makes 4 servings

2 tbsp. butter

2 cups peeled and diced potatoes ( I just washed Matt’s potatoes only)

1/2 cup chopped onion

2 tbsp. flour

1 can chicken broth (you could use vegetable broth)

2 cups milk (I used Hartzler dairy fat free)

3 cups cut up broccoli

2 cups lightly packed grated Cabot Sharp cheddar cheese

1 tsp fresh lemon juice

Salt and black pepper to taste

1. In a large saucepan, melt butter over medium heat. Add potatoes and onion and stir until onion is tender, about 5 minutes.

2. Add flour and cook, stir for 2 minutes longer.

3 Stir in chicken broth and milk. Bring to a simmer and cook until the potatoes are nearly tender, about 5 minutes. Add broccoli and cook until the broccoli is tender, about 5 minutes longer. (At this stage I whirred some of it with an immersion blender because I was also feeding little ones.)

4. Remove from the heat and stir in cheese. Add lemon juice and season with salt and pepper.

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