soup story: garlic broth, the joy of pasta, the power of cojita cheese, a gesture

I was at this red tent women's group--my friend made soup.  It was pasta soup with beans, but she made it with chicken stock, so I didn't have any.  I was hungry and wanted soup, so I was sad--it was one of the first fall evenings of the year.  I guess I was the only vegetarian, but I didn't like envying the soup eaters.

Then the other day, I cooked some pasta.  I was going to eat some right away, then make macaroni salad.  But I ran out of energy for the macaroni salad, so cooked pasta was sitting in the fridge in a pretend tupperware box.

I toyed with the idea of making garlic lover's pasta.  I tried to imagine the creamy garlicky goodness, with peas, if that was what I needed.

I decided to make some pasta soup--it was because of the soup deprivation of the other night.  I know about minestrone, but I never made it before, with its intense tomato broth, pasta, beans, and lots of veg.

This was more of an idea of simple pasta and white bean soup.  I have some canned white beans in the pantry.  I read two recipes online for inspiration and tried to think of what to put in my soup.

Onion, carrot, garlic, garlic broth, garlic powder.  Pasta, of course.  I finally decided against the beans.  They can be a delicious food for me, especially homecooked from dried, but sometimes they can feel more like a chore.  I had/have some mushrooms in the fridge, from a big costco thing of mushrooms, so I put some of those in, quartered.

I debated about canned diced tomatoes.  I knew they would change everything.

Ming chopped my onion, and I sliced up the carrots, mushrooms, garlic cloves.  The soup came together easily.  Ming opened the can of tomatoes for me and poured them into the pot.

The soup was vegan.  I was trying to think if it would be delicious.  Garliciness was the main point--warm salty garlic broth with the pasta making a good carby treat combination, with only veg I really wanted.  No superfluous veg, or eat this veg because it's good for you veg.  Only the favorite loved veg.

I definitely liked the soup, but it seemed a little boring.  The mushrooms were really not adding any flavor.  Maybe the tomatoes were a mistake--they kind of took over.  The garlicness took a backseat to the tomatoness.  Oops.  That can happen.

I had some cheese in the fridge, cotija cheese I bought at the dollar store months ago.  As an experiment I thought I'd add some to my bowl of soup to see if it became more delicious.

I thought probably not.  I was getting down to the end of my second bowl of soup.  I was telling myself I should see how it tasted with cheese, but I didn't want to try it.  The soup was growing on me--the more I ate it, the better it was.  Soup can be like that!

I sniffed the cheese--smelled good.  I sprinkled a little onto my soup, stirred it up, and tried it.  Wow, the soup was twice as good!  How did that happen.  It had a saltiness and deeper flavor.  Everything was different.  I was amazed.

I guess you learn something new every day.  I told Ming the soup was twice as good.  "How could that be?" he asked.  He liked the soup as it was and didn't want to believe me.

I was getting tired.  I really wanted to go to bed.  He'd had some leftover eggplant parm our friend made for dinner the day before, and some soup too.

I thought he was insulting my soup, like it couldn't be improved, but he was trying to praise my soup, like it couldn't be improved.  I was too tired to understand.

We went to bed, and he asked me if I sent the email I said I would.  Nope, I'd forgotten.  So I sent the email from bed, telling his friends he couldn't make it to the Tuesday hike today.

When I got up after midnight, I saw a reply to my email and that in my email, I'd put the body into the subject line.  Yeah, remind me not to email people while I'm asleep.

What do you think.  Have you made soup like this?  I don't bake anymore--it stresses me out, a little bit, and I don't even keep flour on hand, these years.  But soup is a really easy food, for me.  I'm trying to think what I'll do differently next time.

The garlic broth, I was down to the end of the jar.  I put a little water in the jar and asked Ming to shake it.  He shook it for a few seconds and thought he was done.  I took the jar and shook it a lot longer.

I see I'm lingering on this blog post, like there's something more I want to say.  I fantasized about buying some no-chicken chicken broth for my friend, so next time she might make the soup vegetarian.  But I don't want to tell her what to do or cramp her style.  She's 70 and might have been making this soup for a long time.  Who am I to tell people to be vegetarians.

My friend D came over yesterday with her baby.  She was talking about a chicken she bought, eating all the meat, then boiling the bones for soup, all the meals she and her family got from this $5 chicken.  "I know you're a vegetarian," she told me.  I like being a vegetarian who isn't angry and judgy.  She acknowledged my vegetarianism and went on with her story.

I know people go through different stages with food.  I was vegan for a few years--now I'm not.  This friend was vegan also.  She said her kid who's now 11 freaked out when she learned what meat was and where it comes from.  So they went vegan for the kid.  I didn't know it was about the kid.

Our neighbors to the west, the man has a respiratory problem.  He coughs in the worst way I've ever heard anyone cough.  Sometimes at the end of a coughing fit, he'll quietly groan, and I almost cry.  Now that fall is here, no swamp coolers or fans are going, so I can hear it.

I feel sorry for him and his pain.  I wish I could go over there and ask if I can help him.  Maybe I could buy him cough drops or bring him tea, but maybe it's beyond that, like he's dying.

I told my friend about him, how those neighbors scream at each other all day and all night, and how it would be crazy to offer to help this neighbor.  What a weird world, where offering to help my neighbor would be the crazy thing to do!  I've only seen the man once or twice, while he was going from the house to a vehicle.  I think he's in a wheelchair.

The two adults scream at each other.  I hear the teenaged girl scream too sometimes.  "Shut up!" she screams.  The teenaged boy doesn't scream.  The man dying, lack of communication skills, maybe drugs, disability, poverty.  It can't be easy.

Dead tree broken apart, trash in their front yard, a broken chair.  They let the dogs out into the yard one by one.  I've never heard laughter, from over there, or seen anyone smile.  The mom is almost as fat as I am.  They used to have a clothesline too.

I'm fantasizing about just buying some cough drops and leaving them on the fence with a note: For the man who coughs.  Maybe they would throw them away.  Or a dog would eat them.  Maybe he's way beyond cough drops.

But it would be a gesture.  Maybe I should bring them some soup.