On Sunday, Max and I carpooled to the Hollywood Farmer's Market. I was inspired to make potato-leek soup after hearing the chef from Los Angeles' Lou recite a simple recipe on the radio show "Good Food." I filled my bag with leeks, Yukon gold potatoes, Meyer lemons, dandlelion leaves, Page mandarins and dill. The first three ingredients were all I needed for the soup.
I cut the potatoes into small cubes.
I sliced the leeks into half moons and then "sweated" them in a generous amount of butter. Per the Lou chef's suggestion, I used a bit of the green leaves to give the soup some color. But most of the flavor came from the firm white stalks.
After dumping the potatoes into the pot with the soft leeks, I added enough water to cover the veggies by three inches. I then cooked the dandlelion leaves in a steamer set right above the soup mixture. Talk about efficient cooking!
After simmering the leeks and potatoes for an hour, I pureed them in my brand new food processor.
The seasoning was quite simple: I added the juice of one Meyer lemon and sea salt to the puree. Chilled, this soup would be perfect in the summer. But cooking a winter vegetable like leeks in warmer temps would be antithetical to the whole philosophy of farmer's markets, which endorse cooking fruits and vegetables during the months that they are harvested at their peak.
I stuck to simplicity in cooking the dandlelions as well. I drizzled an excellent olive oil that my Italian photographers gave me, along with a sprinkle of fleur de sel, on the bitter greens.
I made so much soup that Miguelito and I had it for dinner twice. For the rerun, I made one of my mom's classic salads out of cucumber, white onions, dill and a plain vinaigrette. Miguelito prepared his childhood comfort food: cubed steak with button mushrooms cooked in butter. East meets West!
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