Summer Soup

Corn and Asparagus Soup Tastes Like Summer!

This soup was sort of an accident of good fortune.  I had boiled fresh corn on the cob the night before.  I had extra corn, and the water it was boiled in, left over.  I also had left over asparagus spears, minus the pretty tips.

I had used the asparagus tips for another recipe and couldn’t bear to throw away the naked stalks.  So, voila!  Corn and asparagus soup was born.

I cut the corn kernels from three cobs and set them aside.  I put the stripped cobs back in the corn water and boiled it until it had reduced to about 4 cups.  I removed the cobs and added the asparagus stalks that had been cut into one inch pieces.  I had a goodly handful of stalks.  I simmered the asparagus for about 5 minutes and added the corn kernels.  I simmered for another 5 minutes and turned the burner off.

After cooling, I ran the concoction through the blender in batches.  Watch out, when blending hot liquids.  The resulting steam can blow the lid off the blender and splash and burn whatever it hits.  I leave the feed hole open and put a dish towel over it to absorb the steam.

After I blended everything up, I wasn’t happy with the consistency.  It was too chunky.  So, I strained out the solids.  The result, was the most beautiful colored, creamy soup that tasted just like summer.  I added about 2 tablespoons of half and half for extra decadence.  No salt was added because the original water I used to boil the corn had been salted.  A few asparagus tips floated on top would have been the “piece de resistance”!   If I ever make this on purpose, I will make sure to save a few tips for garnish.

Corn and Asparagus Fritters

I can’t stand to throw anything away and I was left with the solids that had been strained from the soup.  They looked pretty good to me.  So, I turned  that wet veggie mash into fritters.  I added an egg, some rice flour and some corn flour (corn starch).

I’m pretty much gluten free, thus my flour choices, but you could add regular wheat flour.  I added salt and pepper and let the batter rest for 15 minutes to absorb the flours.  I dropped spoonfuls into a hot non-stick fry pan with a tiny bit of canola oil and a wee pat of butter.  Wow!!  These turned out to be amazingly delicious.  They went perfectly with my accidental summer soup of corn and asparagus.

I think I might be a genius.   Well, probably not, but I felt pretty good about turning some pretty sorry looking leftovers into this lovely summer lunch.