Simple Mushroom Soup

This week has been super cold for this time of year. All I want to do is eat soup. I saw some nice wild mushrooms on the way home tonight, so I brought them home to make a really simple soup. Just an easy throw-stuff-in-a-pot with water and watch it boil kind of soup. Simple but tasty, especially with a little garlic bread.

Here's what I used, but you could use any mix of wild mushrooms and any kind of onions and white-fleshed potatoes.  Just stay away from  Portobello, Cremini or Button mushrooms - they tend to taste plastic and make the broth a little bitter. As always, the better the ingredients, the better the end product. Proportions don't really matter either, as long as the water covers everything in the pot.

Simple Mushroom Soup

1T Unsalted Butter (*use Earth Balance or Olive Oil for vegan*)

Yellow Onion, chopped

Oyster Mushrooms

Shitake Mushrooms

Chantarelle Mushrooms

Fingerling Potatoes, cut into rounds

Water

Salt

Pepper

1. Heat butter in a soup pot over low heat and add onions. Sweat the onions over the low heat while preparing mushrooms.

2. Clean Shitake and Oyster mushrooms under running water (not the normally recommended method, but who cares, we're boiling them here).  Clean the chanterelles by submerging them a few at a time in a bowl of water and swishing them around - lots of dirt and even bugs may float out. If they're especially dirty, rinse them a second time. 

3. Slice shitakes into strips, and tear oyster and chantarelle mushrooms into smaller pieces. Chop potatoes into uniform sized pieces, as well.

4. Add mushrooms and potatoes the pot. Add enough water to cover all the ingredients, 4 Cups is a good starting point. 

5. Increase heat to medium-high and loosely cover the pot. Simmer about 45 minutes and add salt 1/2 tsp at a time, stirring and tasting. If the stock lacks flavor, boil another 15 minutes to concentrate the flavors, and check salt level again. Add pepper to taste.