Buffalo Chicken Soup

I went grocery shopping at Trader Joe's to pick up a couple of items for the week. I like shopping here because they have a great inexpensive wine selection, and yummy cheeses to pair it with. I hate produce shopping here, because items like cilantro and green onions, and the apples are way cheaper at my other fave store, Henry's. I didn't really feel like driving 15 minutes away to grocery shop, and TJ's is way closer to my house, too. So here I am, perusing the cheeses - looking for Gruyere and asiago because I finally found the Parmesan dip recipe from Bottega...and then I start to get a whiff of the whatever the TJ's lady is making. I look over, and to my surprise - it was soup! I took my sample, and fell in love with it, and saw there was the recipe available. I looked it over, and had almost everything at home except for the blue cheese. I was standing right next to the cheeses, so I picked it up as well.

On a side note, I dislike the TJ's lady because she insulted me when I asked her what mirepoix was. She looked at me and said in her most snooty and annoying voice "Well, it seems that you don't watch cooking shows. It's right here, (pointing at a container of carrots, onions and celery). I told her "that's a shortcut of those items - and that I chop all my vegetables myself. Have you heard of sofrito? Same term as well." I really wanted to rip her a new one, and I thought to myself well, that's a french term that I'm not familiar with, and I do cook and watch cooking shows and I gave her a weak thank you, and my sideways eye and walked away.

Aside from the annoying comment from the TJ's lady, I still made the soup. I chopped my mirepoix and used fresh ingredients instead of the already packaged and pre-cut items that the original recipe suggested. Take that TJ's lady!


Buffalo Chicken Soup
Adapted from Trader Joe's
2 chicken breasts, cooked and diced
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons butter
3 celery stalks, diced
1 onion, diced
4 carrots, diced
4 cups chicken broth
1 1/2 cups heavy cream
1 teaspoon hot sauce
1 1/2 cups shredded Monterey jack cheese (or mozzarella)
1 cup crumbled blue cheese
1/2 cup shredded Parmesan
1/3 cup flour
2 tablespoons of Italian parsley, chopped finely

Preparation:
1. Cook chicken as you like. I did a quick marinade of salt, pepper, lemon zest, and the juice of one lemon, 1 tablespoon of fresh rosemary and thyme. Baked it for 25 minutes.
2. Saute mirepoix (carrots, celery and onions) until tender.
3. Stir in broth, heavy cream and hot sauce.
4. In a bowl, toss all the cheeses together and flour. Mix well. Gradually add to soup.
5. Heat until thick and hot, serve with additional hot sauce and extra blue cheese.

Review: What an creamy and cheesy soup, almost like having buffalo wings and blue cheese dressing in a soup. I had served it with a rosemary sourdough dinner roll to dip any extra leftovers in my bowl. This soup was the perfect winter dinner for me.