Mushroom Soup

Mushrooms were on sale the other day at Hyvee.  Since I've been on a healthy living kick lately, I was so psyched to use them.  I had major plans for them - they would be sauteed in a light drizzle of heart healthy olive oil and noshed on as a side dish for some wonderfully prepared breast 'o chicken.  Maybe they would be roasted whole with a bit of kosher salt (new favorite condiment, folks ...) and again with a driz of the heart healthy EVOO.

But reality kicked in and kicked me in the ass.  I had a shitty week at work and decided that life would be better lived with some leftover Chinese takeout and copious amounts of Sprite mixed with Seagrams Seven.  By the time I got out of my funk, my brave little mushrooms were about to look funky.  But since I'm convinced that the Pioneer Woman knows my moods, she came in and saved the day with this recipe from her side project, Tasty Kitchen.

Despite some of my blatant failures with this dish (substituted 2% for heavy cream ... FAIL!  Made a slurry out of flour and water instead of using cornstarch ... FAIL!), it was pretty damn passable.  And it included cooked carrots.  I love cooked carrots - this soup is damn near perfection.  You may find the recipe here.

And it gave me an excuse to use my buddy Paul's homemade hooch ... gotta love someone who makes their own wine.  And then shares it with me.