Taco Soup

Before all my food issues popped up, there was a soup that I used to make that everybody in the family loved: Taco Soup. I got the recipe from a friend, although I'm not sure where she got it from, and it was so, so easy, and so tasty, that I loved this thing to bits and pieces.

Actually, I'll put the original recipes AND the altered recipe here, for anyone who can use it...although this is the original recipe + any alterations my memory has made over the course of time, but it's close.

Recipe #: Tomato Pumpkin Soup

Pumpkin and Tomato plant that will provide for this soup later!

Time: 1 - 2 hours total (including time to cook pumpkin)
(45-60 min. pumpkin cooking time)

Spicy Tomato Soup

Time: 35 min. total (add 3 hours if letting veggie noodles sit. Add 30-60 min. more if you need to make the tomato sauce, too)
(10 min. prep/ 3 hours veggie setting time (can be skipped)/ 25 min. cook)

Ingredients
Plain tomato sauce, as long as it's thin rather than thick (add water to thin, if too thick)
browned ground beef
zucchini, peeled and cubed
zucchini, peeled with a julienne peeler to form noodles (ideally, let sit 3 hours uncovered in fridge)
jalapeño peppers, to taste (I use 1-2 per serving)
Fresh italian oregano, German thyme, marjoram, and golden sage, chopped fine
sea salt to taste

Directions
1. Put all ingredients except the zucchini noodles into a pot. Adjust amounts to taste.

2. Heat to a simmer and keep it there for about 15 minutes. Add the zucchini noodles and cook until desired texture, usually 3-5 minutes. Can be served immediately, but I liked it better the next day after the flavors blended a bit more.

Feeds: Depends on the amounts used. I used 1/4 lb ground beef, 1-2 cups sauce, 1/2 small zucchini plus 1 small julienned zucchini, 2 peppers, and a handful of herbs. That amount made 2 servings.

Shauna's Notes:
Inspired by: The lovely Nicole for showing me an easy way to make plain tomato sauce, plus a hungry belly and a limited pantry before market day

What worked: The taste was great, spicy and tangy. Texture was good for a soup, maybe even a bit thicker than expected. Quite pretty, too.

What didn't work: Nothing, really. It was nice.

What could be done to improve it: A garnish might be rather pretty, which I didn't have time or energy to do this time. The zucchini noodles might look prettier if I got a larger zucchini, as my small one ended up with very short noodles.

Easy Tomato Sauce

Time: 35-90 min. total - greatly dependent on quantity
(15-30 min. prep/ 20-60 min cook)

Cooking tomatoes and fresh herbs for the sauce

Easy Tomato Sauce

Ingredients
Lots and lots of ripe tomatoes, chopped coarsely
sea salt to taste
fresh herbs (I used a handful of italian or greek oregano plus a little marjoram and a sprig of sage, this time. Basil is good too.)

Directions
1. Put the chopped tomatoes and sea salt into a pot and cook at a simmer or low boil. I usually use a low boil.

2. Keep cooking until the skins begin to peel away from the tomatoes a little. The tomatoes will look mushy at this point. Not a big deal if you cook it a bit too long, though. This usually takes me about, oh, 15-25 minutes, maybe? I don't keep track really well, honestly.

3. Turn off the heat and put the tomatoes into a blender to purée them until smooth. Put them back into the pot and continue to simmer. Too high a heat will burn the tomato sauce, but too low and it takes WAY too long for it to thicken up. Kind of a judgement call on the temp, here.

4. Add chopped, fresh herbs to taste. Basil and oregano go well, usually, for a first try. Continue to simmer until the sauce reaches desired thickness and sweetness. The longer it boils, the sweeter it gets. I understand if you want tomato paste, just keep boiling until it's extra-thick (haven't tried that yet, though).

Feeds: How much you make is affected by how many tomatoes you use, obviously. About 8 vine ripened tomatoes plus 3-4 larger heirloom tomatoes made 3-4 pints of sauce by the time it boiled down to the thickness I wanted.

Shauna's Notes:
Inspired by: My friend Nicole, who took pity on my sad lack of cooking skills and showed me how to make a quick, GF tomato sauce.

What worked and didn't work: It's a nice sauce as long as you have enough time to cook it. If you cook it for too short a time, the tomato flavor is less sweet and more of that tart, raw-ish tomato taste, which my son hates. Also, as the cooking time affects the thickness, this can take a while to get it as thick as you may desire. So far, haven't had a bad herb combination, but more is almost always better. My sauce does contain seeds as I don't leave those out.

What would improve it: This is a really basic sauce, which I typically spruce up when I actually use it in a recipe. For the most basic sauce, I don't even add the herbs. I like to make a big batch like this because then I can add whatever type of flavor-style I want, like for Italian dishes or Mexican ones.

Herb combinations:

1. Marjoram, winter savory, and greek oregano
2. Marjoram, winter savory, and rosemary
3.  For Italian spaghetti-style sauce, I usually add chopped zucchini, bell peppers, hot peppers, garlic, sometimes chopped kale or swiss chard, and meat. I've also used chopped carrots, as well.
4.  For Mexican sauces, I often add onion, garlic, mexican sage, greek oregano. I'll frequently add chopped cilantro and sliced avocado on top, after it's done cooking.

NOTES:
3/7/13 - Since first making this, I have had the best success using suggestions from some lovely folks at my farmer's market. Now, instead of regular ripe tomatoes, I get some over-ripe and some under-ripe tomatoes - heirloom ones worked awesome, but mixing them with regular tomatoes is probably more affordable. Then, I cooked them until the tomatoes were mush, then blended them up and then kept cooking.  This made a much sweeter tomatoes sauce, both the over-ripe tomatoes and the longer cooking time. Really quite lovely.