Thai Coconut Soup with More Expensive Wine plus an Open Letter to Martha Stewart.

Today I went for a St. Supery Fume Blanc to start off with. I thought it would be good to push the edge of the cheap wine rut I had been stuck in for a while. Actually, it tasted a bit like  Boone's Farm, but without all the sugar and costing more than three dollars. Also, it tasted good. You know what I mean. The taste of all those pears, cherries and apples but without the urge to light it all on fire from the bottle while pouring it over a six pack of Hostess Twinkies.

 Expensive wine is like that.

With Thai Coconut Soup it is important to remember that any vegetable can be thrown into this thing. Thai people are not as strict on the proper veggie mix as Caucasian people who write Thai recipe books like to pretend that they are.

Since we are going for authenticity I am going for whatever is in my fridge that might spoil. I have corn on the cob which I will cut off the cob, red bell peppers, portobello mushrooms, purple cabbage, small potatoes, spring onions, and broccoli. It's all going in.

Now I *did* go to the store. When I bought the wine, I also bought a few things one might really want to have to have on hand just in case you want to make this actually work out for you. These included; coconut milk, fresh cilantro,  serrano chili peppers, basil leaves, garlic, limes, and a soup base.

I tried to buy lemon grass and kaffir lime leaves but the local Pac 'n Save is only hip enough to carry $15 wine on a discount. That's about it. To make up for the lack of the necessary items I bought a concentrate Thai green curry paste.

It'll do, pig. It'll do.

 I mean, really, if you were actually going to go all authentic on it's ass you'd have started with a ham bone and you didn't, did you?

I didn't think so.

Anyway, I already own powdered galangal. You can use regular ginger but that shit is not the same thing at all. Not to say that ginger is not awesome. It is. It really is! But it is just not the same thing.

 And you, Martha? You didn't even tell them to include ANY ginger what-so-ever? What the hell kind of soup are you making?

I think middle America can handle a little ginger. I know that you've been in jail and you want to protect others from the kinds of things that you've seen. You know, I once caught a galangal by the tail and tried to extract the pungent spice from its scent glands. I can say in all honesty that it wasn't pretty. Have you ever expressed an ass of a wild dog with razor sharp canines? Well neither have I. But ginger is pretty safe even if it causes you some PTSD episodes. Leave in the ginger, for god's sake. Breathe and repeat this affirmation with me! "Just because it smells similar doesn't mean it's going to bite you on the cooter."

 BTW,  I know I told you all to be creative, but what the fuck is up with an english cucumber as a garnish on a goddamn Thai soup? Really, Martha? And Fuck You with your lemons! This isn't Goddamn British Codfish.  And, you didn't even say to add ANY peppers.... ? At all? The curry paste isn't going to carry itself, you know.

Now, it is up to you to tweek your recipe. You could put chicken in there or pork or cow or tofu or peanuts. Today I am not doing any of that. But YOU could. It's just that kind of soup. I encourage you to go crazy with it. Just be careful.

But first, the garlic.

You really must use fuckloads of garlic. I enjoy the use of a garlic press. Some say this is not necessary. Some say that this is cheating. To those people I say; Fuck you! And for those of you who want me to tell them exactly what a "fuckload" is, I say;   Here at "Many Much Cookings of Greatness," we don't infantalize our readers like those lackeys over at say..... Martha Stewert's blog do.

 Just sayin'.

After you press the garlic in the pan, you should chop up some onions. I am using spring onions. You can use whatever the hell onions you want.

I *do* have sesame oil on hand. It's way better than that crap Martha Stewert told you to fry up onions in and it's really cheap so long as you just go to an any regular asian market instead of Whole "Ooops! I-Fucked-Ur-Rent- Budget-Up-So-Now-You-Have-to-Eat-At-Soup-Kitchens-For-The-Rest-Of-The-Month!" Market.


You will want to gut and chop your serrano chili peppers while wearing gloves unless you like hella seeds in your soup and you want your ass ring to burn like fire at regular intervals in the day. You should know by now about the gloves and that no amount of Vaseline will take the burning away until you've cried enough salty salty tears over your hands.

Actually, I didn't wear gloves.

And I kept all the seeds in unlike all you pussies.

Now here is where the sesame oil comes in. Put that shit in the pan. I don't know how much,  just put it in there. You want enough to saute some crap. I think you can handle eye-balling that amount? You know how to saute, right? Ok! Do that thing that that thing entails! You Go! I believe in you!

By now you will be done with the chopping and the saute-ing. It is time to fill a large pot with water and cause it to boil!

YEEE-Haww! Beers, Steers, and Queers!
(shhh... do a little dance here.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyGp98Xoq9g&feature=related

Once it boils, put your entire can of coconut milk in along with the juice of three or four limes. Put a teaspoon in of galangal, or not. Put in enough soup mix for the water, and then add a healthy few flings of the green curry paste. Add your saute'd stuff in and then realise! "Oh NO! I forgot the soy sauce!" So add that, too. Put all liquidy boil-ey things into the larger pot with all the chopped and waiting veggies. Add more water until the pot is kinda full and then add half the cilantro you bought.

Now it's full!

Put a lid on it and set it to low/medium. Add another lime. Add some more galangal, but only if you can stand the pain. Also, throw in a glass of the wine. It's like christening a boat!

But please! Without the broken glass!

You did refrain from throwing glass in there, didn't you?

Oh Shit! There is no time! The basil! Put the basil in! Now Now Now!

 That......... was close!

Martha, why did you tell them to just add basil as a simply a garnish? Are you afraid of basil, too?

You know that it has none of the agitated spiciness of galangal, right? I've worked with people from the prison system. I know that it does funny things to people. Are you becoming one of those folks that believes cornstarch and catsup are enough?

It's not enough, Martha.

 Just because cornstarch causes things to  have the consistency of cum does not mean that it automatically contains protien! You have to listen to me and hold my hand.

Just try to say this with me: "Items that might not go into pruno are still worth cooking with. Items that might not go into pruno are still worth cooking with!"

 Please! We can work through this together.  I'm a professional. Just trust me enough to take this dried galangal. I swear it won't bite.

How to Make Soup!

      First you make soup by getting out a really large ass pot.  You are going to need a pot because a pan is too small to make soup in and you can't make soup on a plate. You are going to use a large ass pot because everything that might go bad in your fridge, barring a few items and adding a few others, is going to go into that pot. You should adjust the size of "large ass" to fit your personal needs. If you, say, live in Oakland, what might be a "large ass" for someone else might be a medium sized or small ass to you, particularly if that other person lives in, say, Mendocino County. I hear that there is a lot of speed there. For the hipster boys that thought it would be fun to start an ironic frat house two doors down from you and play loud football in the street at 11pm on a Monday night, this might mean be the equivalent of a sauce pan.

     Onions and garlic go in first. They don't *have* to go in first. If you find you forgot to put them in first you can always put them in later.  It will really not make that much of a difference. But you want to put in the garlic and onion first if you are into that sauteing thing. Soup can be made without sauteing and it is fine, but today you are going to saute. Other cooking peoples say to saute in a frying pan or wok. This is bullshit unless you like cleaning more dishes.

It's important to add one fuckload of minced garlic and two fuckloads of chopped onions to the pot with no heat. Then you are going to add just south of a shitload of olive oil, or enough to coat everything on the bottom of the pan and turn on the heat. Don't turn on the heat before or you might burn your garlic. Burnt garlic sucks and you don't want it in your soup.

Tip: send your husband out to chop the onions in the backyard with goggles. This works way better than the other way you have been doing it.

Start to add some salt and pepper to your mix, then decide to use the Penzey's Ruth Ann's Muskego Ave. Chicken and Fish Seasoning, which is really a sort of lemon pepper salt thing and you have been putting it on most everything since you got it despite your original suspicion of it as being just glorified salt. Plus your mother-in-law got it for you.

Stir everything until the onions are no longer just white, but are now kind of a pearl color.

At this point it is really time to open the red wine. Pour in half a bottle. This is going to leave you and your husband with only a glass each and you are going to want more. You should have bought more, but you were thinking that one bottle of wine and one bottle of vodka would be enough last night. You were mistaken. So, plan a wine run in the middle of your soup making.

Pull everything veggie or meat that might go bad out of your fridge. Be sure to sniff the sausages and check if they have a sticky or slimy texture before chopping them up and putting them in the pot.

Tip: A bad smelling or slimy sausage is not something you should put in your pot. Tell your husband to shower or perhaps get that thing checked out by a qualified physician.

Potatoes go in early if you want a creamy texture of dissolved potato or late if you want chunks. Scrub well, but don't bother peeling them. Why would you peel them, anyway? Carrots should be peeled, however. You then add chopped bell peppers, tomatoes, turnips, and  yellow squash in the pot. You chop up some fresh basil and then realize you have to add the entire bunch because you chopped it on top of the sausage area and you can't put that shit back now because it might turn septic. So, the equivalent of a  fuckload of basil goes into the pot. You also add some Herbs de Provance because it sounds cool and your mother-in-law got it for you.

Your pot is now full. You will have to put the other vegetable back in the fridge. Hopefully you have added some water to the pot so you have a pot full of both  vegetables *and* boiling water or you might need to separate the batch into two pots. You don't have any broth, but Bragg's will do just fine. It's really the same thing anyway, right? And plus, look at the shiny hair!

Now you are ready for your wine run. Put it on simmer and tell your three cats to make sure the house doesn't burn down while you are gone.

Target is the place to go for the soup wine run. While there you can also pick up other things like lint brushes and attempt to find some sort of ginger matching foundation for your husband. Sadly, you find that Target, like MAC, has a bias against gingers and there is no foundation there for anyone with a pink based complexion. The MAC store clerk lied when she said that adding blush to the light foundation would convert it to a ginger hue. Instead, it converted your husband into a large carrot. Don't believe the MAC counter ladies.

You notice that there are a plethora of hot ladies at the Target. Was this always the case or did more ladies become hot as you hit your mid-thirties? When you realize that you said this out loud you notice that the woman in the yellow polka dot dress is quickly moving away from you and into the next aisle. Maybe this is because you have a little of the impetigo left over on your face which your cat gave you last month. It's not a good look.

There is a really hot Amazonianly tall giant red head of a woman in front of you and your husband at the check out line wearing only an oversized man's work shirt and cowboy boots. Your husband looks at you and says something about that being the way he wants to die. You hit him in the arm, but secretly you agree.You both decide it would be a bad idea to ask her if she knows anything about ginger foundation.

Back at home, you can now open the second bottle of wine.


Taste your soup. If it is a little bland,  add  one buttload of Bragg's and a half a bottle of the newly opened wine.

If your flavors are still off, add some of that spicy beer mustard that worked so well when you were making corned beef and some siracha because siracha goes in everything.  Stir and taste again. The flavors should now be starting to have a harmony. Add just a bit of thyme and this  thing called "Mural of Flavor" from Penzey Spices because the name sounds cool and your mother-in-law got it for you. You might add a lemon, but you do not have a lemon.

Boil down for an hour until the flavor is more concentrated and enjoy!