Recipe - Roobys Cream Of Broccoli Soup

3 tablespoon Butter
1 lg Onion; chopped
5 Stalks celery; chopped
1 qt Chicken stock
3 pound Broccoli florets
24 ounce Evaporated milk; (2 cans)
1 cup Grated cheddar cheese; or to
taste
3 tablespoon Flour
Salt; to taste
Fresh ground black pepper;
to taste

1. In bottom of large soup pot, saute onions and celery in butter over
medium heat until softened but do not brown. Add broccoli and enough
chicken stock to not quite cover.

2. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to low and simmer until broccoli is
quite tender, but not cooked to mush, about 1 hour.

3. With hand blender, puree broccoli and broth. If desired, remove a few
pieces before pureeing and add back in when finished.

4. Pour one can of evaporated milk into handblender container, add the
flour, and blend.

5. Add flour/milk mixture to soup along with cheddar cheese. Bring soup
just to a boil while stirring. Soup should now have a moderately thick
consistency. Add remaining can of milk, mixing with more flour if necessary
to bring soup to desired consistency.

6. When soup has thickened, remove from heat or put on VERY low heat so
that milk doesn't 'break'. If necessary, gently reheat small batches in
saucepan or in microwave. Soup will keep for 34 days in refrigerator.

Notes:

This is a 'Costco Special' soup...I make it on days that I go to Costco
because I get the ingredients there and it's fast. In my area they sell a
3pound bag of washed broccoli florets, which is what I based the recipe
on.

I generally use evaporated milk in cream soup recipes for a couple of
reasons. First, I've found that evaporated milk has less of a tendency to
'break' or curdle in soups than fresh halfandhalf or cream. Second,
evaporated milk is much more convenient and easy to have on hand.

Recipe by: Rooby

Posted to MCRecipe Digest V1 #860 by MsRooby msrooby@blarg.net on Oct
22, 1997