Winter Greens & Chickpea Soup

It's raining today and a perfect day for making soup. I tore out a soup recipe from last week's Food Section of the Los Angeles Times and asked the dogs if they wanted to go to the kitchen. They followed me there flopping on the floor. Will strolled in a few minutes later and then went and cozied up to the window seat listening to the rain and reading a book. I poured a glass of wine and sipped it as I diced and minced and rinsed.
Soup with winter greens and chickpeas:1/4 Cup Olive Oil
2 carrots, diced
1 stalk celery, diced
1 onion, diced
1 turnip, diced
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 pound chopped mixed greens (mustard, kale, turnip, etc)
1/2 teaspoon minced rosemary
1 16oz. can chickpeas, rinsed and drained
1/3 cup grated Parmigiano
1 baguette sliced and toasted

In heavy soup pot, warm the olive oil and add the carrots, celery, onion and turnip. Cover and cook until softened, about 20 minutes. Stir in the garlic and cook until fragrant, 2 or 3 minute.
Add the mixed greens a handful at a time, stirring and giving them time to soften and shrink before adding the next handful. When all the greens have cooked, add 8 cups of water, 1/2 teaspoon of salt, the rosemary and chickpeas. Bring to a simmer , cover and maintain a simmer. Cook until the broth is deeply flavored, 45 minutes to 1 hour.When ready to serve, stir in 1/3 cup Parmigiano cheese and season to taste with pepper. Arrange two toasted slices of baguette in the bottom of each warm soup bowl and ladle the soup over the top. Sprinkle with more cheese to taste.

Serves 8
235 calories

We're going to head downtown to see Pan's Labyrinth and we'll come home to the soup for dinner.

Getting Outdoors

It's certainly been a while since I've been outdoors. Not that I haven't gone outside. That I do every day. But "outdoors" is different. It's really getting outdoors, out in the fresh air and in a pair of good walking shoes, on a trail up a mountain. It's been soooo chilly lately and I've just had other things to do post-holidays. But this afternoon we got our gear on and hit the trail at Ferndell and trekked on up to the Observatory. My lungs were telling me that I needed to do this more often. And man I wish I could. Oh well, I'll do it when I can.Because the renovations are done and the trail is open clear up to the observatory we exited the trail onto the front lawn of the observatory and at the top of the trail was this sign directing us to additional parking. Funny. Will says "You mean we coulda brought the car?"We walked up around the top deck and then went inside. When we came during it's grand re-opening weekend it was much much more crowded, and so it was nice to be able to get to some of the exhibits that we couldn't get to the first time. We went down to the sub-level and weighed ourselves on all the planets and created our own earthquake at the display with its seismic roll and the little red pen making great jiggly lines as we laugh and jump up and down enthusiastically in front of it.

Ranger and Jiggimus

Best buds sitting at the window, watching the world go by.

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