Dark Days Soup #2

Hey! Guess what?! I have OIL! Not just any oil, local oil! I got some Wisconsin sunflower oil. Let's face it, my last soup sucked. I did have 5 bowls of it and it was a meal for me. It wasn't the best soup I have ever made. I was not prepared going into the first week of the Dark Days challenge. My wife told me it was just a "base" to add other things to. It was missing a lot.

I did the same thing this week as last week. I went to the co-op and looked for the "buy local" stickers and bought everything I could with the intention of making a soup. The first thing on my list was the oil; I had to saute stuff. I also picked up a bag of onions, carrots, purple potatoes, dried black beans, wild rice, purple cabbage... I had a bag of rutabagas, homemade wine, a frozen tomato from the garden... I think that's it...

I sauteed one onion in the sunflower oil, added a diced carrot ten minutes later. Then I added a half of diced rutabaga and 3 small diced purple potatoes. I let that cook for a couple minutes. Then I cleared the bottom of the pan with some homemade wine from grapes from my yard. Added 4-5 cups of water. Then I added the black beans and wild rice. I let it cook for an hour or so then I added a small amount of diced cabbage and the diced tomato and let it cook for 15 more minutes.

Everything is Daniel Fast friendly and local...wait... I did add salt and pepper to the soup. I read some other blogs and not everyone was 100% local like I thought the challenge meant, so I added them. AND the wine is not Daniel Fast friendly, I remembered after I made the soup.

The result: It needs meat! I have really been craving ham. This soup and the last soup have not had the soul of a soup with meat. It does need more seasonings as-well. I really wanted to put a bay leaf in the soup or other herbs. The only herbs I have from the garden are lemon balm and chamomile. So I have some hunting to do for local dried herbs.