Asparagus & Rice Soup with Pancetta and Black Pepper

"Asparagus inspires gentle thoughts" ~ Charles Lamb

I wonder if it's too late to make this soup my entry for the premiere edition of Is My Blog Burning?~Soup that took place back in the beginning of February? I missed that first event because the Little One and I were still trying to figure each other out, mainly just trying to get into a schedule that worked for both of us. Anyway, the soup turned out really well and is a soup that is packed full of flavor and texture and is good for whatever ails you, be it a nasty cold that has taken over your body, a bad day at the office, or a baby who developed a fever after her first immunization shots...this soup will comfort the soul. I promise.

The recipe came from a new book I recently picked up, The Zuni Cafe Cookbook by Judy Rodgers. I've heard a lot of good things about this book and so, after months of browsing through it in the bookstore, I finally just plunked down the money and took it home. I'm sure the people at the bookstore were happy. psst, there's that woman who always flips through, but never buys the books! So far, I'm pretty happy with the cookbook, although I've only cooked the one recipe from it. I like the emphasis on fresh ingredients, the cooking lessons and the recipes for things like; Preserved Lemon-Caper Butter, Toasted Bread Crumb Salsa, and Pasta with Preserved Tuna and Pine Nuts There are recipes I'll probably never make because the ingredients are not so easy to come by, (even here in Manhattan), like squab, guinea hen, quail and glasswort, but still, the book promises a lot and I'm eager to try more things from it.

For some reason, the recipe was for only about 4 cups of soup, which in this house, is way too little since we like to eat things again the next day and sometimes if there’s enough, freeze the leftovers for another time. I ended up tripling the recipe. It's a fairly easy soup to make and that's a plus in my book. Remember, I tripled the recipe but I'll write it out here in the quantities that were in the book. I heated about a 1/4 cup of olive oil in a 4-quart saucepan over medium-low heat and added 2 cups of diced yellow onion (I forgot the pinch of salt). I stirred regularly, trying not to let the onions color but to just "sweat" them so that they released their moisture and became tender and translucent. After about 10 minutes I added 1/4 cup Arborio rice (you can certainly use other rice), 3-1/2 cups chicken stock, and a 1/2 cup of water and brought that to a simmer, then covered the pot and let the soup cook until the rice was tender, about 20 minutes. While the rice was cooking I sliced about 8 ounces of asparagus on the bias and minced about 2/3 of a cup of pancetta, then sautéed them in 2 tablespoons of olive oil, stirring to coat, then stirring just enough for the asparagus to become tender. careful here, I overcooked the asparagus, which, for the first night wasn't bothersome because there was still some "give" to it, but the second day it became mushy and just wasn’t the same Once that was ready I added the pancetta/asparagus mixture to the soup, brought everything to a boil, added A LOT of fresh ground black pepper and served it up. The soup was delicious with the Rosemary-Olive Oil bread I made earlier that day.

Written by Deb on March 16, 2004 10:54 AM