You might think that I’d do something springlike for an Easter Soup. Or at least something with Earth Day in mind. Much as I like my food holidays, I went with what I really wanted to make: Red Beans and Rice.

Last week I fell off my soup blog because my gal and I went to NYC (New York City!) to visit with friends and see a Broadway show. By the time we got back Sunday there was no way soup was happening. Then the week got really hectic and my good intentions of catching up midweek went out the window. The play, a revival of Anything Goes, was terrific by the way, and since we bought our tickets before it opened it wasn’t all that expensive. Well, everything’s relative.

I did have soup while I was in New York. We had dinner at the Atlantic Grill on the upper east side, and I had their lobster bisque. While mine (Lobster Bob Goes Bisque-o) had more lobster in it and was pretty good, theirs was better; much richer and tastier.  Of course, being a seafood restaurant, they have an unfair advantage in the easy access to lobster shells.

On the way home we stopped at the Popeye’s restaurant just over the Delaware border on Route 95. We don’t frequent many fast food places, but Popeye’s holds a place in our hearts from when we were dating and driving long distances to see each other up and down the eastern seaboard. While I’m a fan of the spicy crispy chicken, and she shakes her head at my cholesterol death wish, we both agree that their red beans and rice are some of the best we’ve had in or out of New Orleans.

All of which made me want more. So I decided to make up a batch this week and call it soup. It is, more or less.

Red Beans and Rice with Andouille Sausage

• 16 oz dried kidney beans
• 2 qt water
• 16 oz andouille sausage (Smithfield)
• 2 cups chopped onion
• 1 cup chopped green pepper
• 1 cup chopped celery
• 4-6 medium cloves garlic, minced
• 2 tbs vegetable oil
• 6 tsp Zatarains Creole Seasoning
• 1 cup Nashiki rice

I soaked the beans overnight in two quarts of water, then drained them in the morning, checked them over for stones (it happens) and put them in my soup pot with a fresh two quarts, brought them up to a simmer, covered them and set a timer for an hour and a half.

Then I chopped up all the vegetables, which I mixed together (except the garlic) and put aside. I chopped up the sausage as well, making quarter round pieces about a third of an inch thick.

I sauteed the vegetables until they were starting to get soft, and added them at the end of the first half hour of simmering. While those ingredients were getting to know each other, I lightly browned the sausage in a skillet to kick up its flavor and put it aside until about the hour mark.

After the beans had a full hour of cooking they had gotten pretty soft, but not quite done. Before adding the browned sausage I roughly pulsed the soup with my immersion blender to make a partly smooth soup. The vegetables were largely floating on top so I carefully worked my way down, being sure I left some of the beans reasonably intact. You can alway take a quart out and blend it seperately, but I like a more even blend.

In went the sausage, as well as six tablespoons of Zatarain’s Creole Seasoning and I put the cover on for the final half hour of cooking. When the time’s up, check the seasoning and adjust with salt (and maybe cayenne) as needed. The Zatarain’s is pretty salty, so you may well not need any more salt.

Red beans and Rice wouldn’t be complete without the rice part, and we like to use a sticky Japanese rice (Naskiki) to do the job. After some trial and error, here’s our magic formula:

• 1 part Naskiki rice
• 2 parts water
• 1 pinch salt per cup of rice

Put the rice, water and salt in a saucepan that seals fairly well.

Bring to a boil, then turn the heat back to low.

Don’t open the pot or you’ll lose the balance of water and rice.

Cook for 20 minutes, being careful not to let it boil over.

If you’re serving out from the pot to the table, put a 1/4 cup ball of rice in the center of each bowl and ladle the soup around it. If you’re sending it off or storing it in bulk, mix in the three cups of cooked rice into the soup and stir it in. Keeping the rice separate is better, but mixing it in is still pretty good.

I came up with just under four quarts of soup, a little shy of what I really wanted. Adding in a 16 oz can kidney beans wouldn’t have hurt the flavor, and would have extended it about right.

For the next two weeks I’ve got all day classes  both Saturday and Sunday, so making soup is going to be something of a challenge. One I think I’m up to, but we’ll see how it goes.

Links/Sources

• Atlantic Grill NYC: www.atlanticgrill.com
• Popeye’s Louisiana Kitchen: www.popeyes.com
• Nishiki Rice: [amazon_link id=”B0000CNU3R” target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]sold by pacific rim[/amazon_link]