I have no idea what the name of this soup means. I know what Lake Erie is, and roughly where it is. And I bet that "clipper" refers to a clipper ship, a ship most commonly used around the turn of the century to quickly (by the standards of those days) get goods from the east coast to the west coast by sailing all the way around South America. Neither one of these concepts appear in this soup, and no insight is offered by the recipe's contributor. It's from Tiffany's fundraising cookbook, Homeward Bound. It sounded like it would be really yummy, and it is soup season, after all. We had this with bread and butter. It's a bit light on veggies, but none of us mind that. At all.
Lake Erie Clipper Soup
5 cups beef broth, divided
1 tsp dried thyme
1 tbsp olive oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 lb stew beef, cut into 1/2 inch cubes
2 medium onions, chopped
salt and pepper
1 bay leaf
1/4 cup pearl barley (I used "quick" barley)
1/2 cup small shell macaroni (I used mini alphabet pasta)
2 cups stewed tomatoes (I used diced tomatoes, 14.5 oz can)
Heat oil in large soup pot over medium heat. Dredge meat in flour, salt, and pepper (it doesn't tell you how much, but I used 1/4 cup flour, 1 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp pepper) and brown in pot. Add garlic and onions, brown lightly. Add 4 cups of broth. Bring to a boil for 3-5 minutes. Add bay leaf. Simmer gently x 1 hour. Add remaining broth. Bring to a boil. Add barley, macaroni, and tomatoes. Simmer 30 minutes. Then remove the bay leaf.
So, it never tells you what to do with the thyme. I added it when I added the bay leaf.
So this was pretty good. The kids all liked it, because they like alphabet soup because of Martha Speaks (a cartoon on PBS where the dog eats alphabet soup and then she can talk and read and stuff). We ate about half of it, and remaining half is going into the freezer to eat on a zombie night (those are the nights when I feel like a zombie. I don't act like one. I don't want to eat anyone's brains or anything. Just in a haze of tiredness).
1 comment:
Today as I finished making Lake Erie Clipper Soup, a soup we have enjoyed since 1990, I decided to Google and see if this recipe ever made it to the internet. I was happy to read about it on your New Recipe Night sight and thought you might be interested in how this soup received its name. My soup recipe comes from a special edition of the Food Writers' Favorites: Soups, Stews and Casseroles, a small cookbook I received from MADD after making a donation. It varied just a bit from your recipe in that It did not use flour, 4 cups of broth are brought to a simmer and then the thyme is added, the olive oil is heated in a heavy soup pot; add garlic and when you can smell the garlic in the steam, add stew meat and onion; brown and drain fat. Add hot beef broth to meat in soup pot, stir, scraping browned bits from the bottom. Add the bay leaf. boil 5 minutes, and skim the surface. The rest of the directions are just like the one you follow.
My husband grew up in northern Ohio and lived 25 miles from Lake Erie and often spoke of the huge amounts of lake effect snow his small town would receive every winter. Needless to say, when I saw this recipe, I had to make it and it has become one of our favorites. Here is the introduction to the soup that appears in that cookbook. It is written by Jim Hillibish, Food Editor, "The Repository," Canton, Ohio and I am assuming it is his recipe.
"Northern Ohioans suffer winter blasts of Artic air riding deep, fast-moving troughs of low pressure from Canada. These Alberta
clippers, as we call them, blow in minus 20 degree wind chills and howling storms. Nights such as these require something strong,
fortifying and satisfying. That means thick, rich soup, almost a stew, the kind that makes a meal in a bowl. Don't forget the crusty
sourdough bread, heaped high with apple butter."
Since I have come across your sight, I look forward to trying some of your recipe picks. I enjoyed reading your story as to how New Recipe Night all began and give you an A+ for trying to figure out how this soup received its name : ) I am not interested in having this comment published but just wanted to pass on the information that I had.
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