Soup and Hearts

        Fall has finally come to Florida! Woke up to a brisk 63 degrees this morning. We had to break out the sweaters! So I have taken my blogging outside to enjoy this beautiful day, the humidity is low, the sky is blue, and I'm off work today!

There's a tiny patch of leaves changing color!

       Whenever there is a chill in the air, I just crave soup. We love soup in my family. My mother has been known to make a "leftover soup" where she just basically throws a bunch of leftovers from the week in a pot and it always turns out delicious. I didn't really end up with leftovers this week so I decided to make a "whatever you have in the pantry and fridge" kind of soup. I've had a jar of artichokes hanging out in the pantry for over a week that have been begging me to make something out of them. Also, I had some fresh spinach that was on the verge of needing to be thrown out, so why not make a spinach artichoke soup? I had contemplated making a dip, however to make a good dip you really need cream cheese and alas, I was all out. The end result was actually really good considering the smorgasbord of ingredients I threw together. And of course, I had some leftovers to take to my mama:)
 
                                       Spinach Artichoke Soup

Ingredients:

1 tbsp olive oil
1tbsp butter
2 small onions (or one medium one); chopped fine
2-3 cloves garlic, minced
1 12 oz jar artichoke hearts, drained and lightly rinsed if marinated; roughly chopped
2c fresh baby spinach, or thawed, drained frozen spinach
2c chicken broth or stock
1 tbsp flour
dash of salt
1/4 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/2 jar alfredo sauce
1/4 c half and half or heavy whipping cream ( or you could also use milk)
1c mozzarella cheese, shredded
1/4 c parmesan cheese, shredded

1) Add the oil and butter to your pot over medium high heat

Butter and olive oil..the magic combination

2) Once butter is melted, add onions. Stir and cook 3-5 minutes or until onions are translucent.

Buttered onions, yum

3) Once the onions are good and ready, add your garlic.

Silly garlic, get in that pot

4) Cook and stir onions and garlic 1-2 minutes. Add the whole 2c of spinach. (it looks like a lot, but it wilts in no time) Cook spinach mixture just until it wilts, 3-5 minutes.

I was pretty impressed with the steam in this picture..

5) Add the chopped artichokes and sprinkle the 1 tbsp flour and seasonings on top. 

Get in my belly

6) Cook 2-4 minutes, just until the mixture starts getting a little thick. Add the 2 cups of chicken broth.

Starting to look like soup!

7) Reduce heat to medium low, cover and let simmer 10-15 minutes, stirring occasionally. Longer if you can, but I was starving and wanted it done as soon as possible!

8) Add the half jar of alfredo sauce and the half and half. (here's where the cream cheese would have been awesome, but sometimes you just got to use up those half jars you got lying around!)

My favorite part, when it gets creamy...

9) Let that incorporate together to heat everything back up, then add both the cheeses. Stir for about 1-2 minutes to let the cheese melt nicely together.

10) Taste, and adjust to your liking. I ended up adding a few dashes of red pepper flakes, but I have to have a little spice on everything! The alfredo sauce really helps adding some dimension of flavors without having to doctor it up too much.

11) Turn off the stove and cover the soup, let stand for 5 min just to merry the flavors together. Serve warm with a little extra parmesan on top. I also am a cracker fiend so I added those too, after I took the picture.

Doesn't get better than a hot bowl of soup

And there you have it! A nice warm bowl of comforting soup reminiscent of spinach artichoke dip but you get to eat it with a spoon! And as an added bonus, you also get to clear out your fridge without having to throw any food away. Which is just not something we do. I have seriously found about a tablespoon of tomato soup in a tiny tupperware container in my mom's fridge. Her response? "Well, I might need it for something.." Indeed, mother.