Broccoli Soup...and bugs

I made a simple supper of broccoli soup with toasted bread last night. With the unusually warm weather for the Rocky Mountains, knowing winter is right around the corner, Monte and me have been working outside till dark. Once you harvest the main broccoli heads (I froze 26 lbs last month) the plants produce side shoots we tend to eat as they come. Since we were out of town, I harvested a bunch this week. Some had aphids so I kept soaking them in new basins of water. That's what I made the soup with.

I combined two recipes: one from our farm share newsletter and the other from the FoodNetwork.com. It was really good.

Saute in 3 Tb butter:

1-2 sliced onions

1-1 1/2 lb broccoli

1 tsp fresh thyme

(tsp fresh tarragon - I didn't taste this)

2-3 garlic cloves, minced

salt and pepper

3 Tb flour

Add 3 C chicken broth.

When the broccoli is soft enough puree with a hand-held blender in the pan.

Add 1/2-1 C cream to thin enough while pureeing.

Put in soup bowls and sprinkle a handful of grated cheese over the tops of the soup bowls and broil till melted and browning.

When almost done with our soup I said to Monte, "since we're also eating aphids, I'm reminded of the India study".

Actually I'll mention 2 studies. The first was done years ago on farm raised kids vs city kids and the growing amount of allergies. It's thought that because of such a focus on sterility and anti-bacterial everything, kids immune systems were not developing very strong, thus more allergies. 

Another more recent study has concluded that when people from India move to the western civilization, like going to school and living in England, and yet remaining vegetarian, they are developing poor health because the produce in the western countries is 'cleaner' - no bacteria and bugs!

Food for thought ...