Cauliflower cheese soup

One day, not too long ago, I was sitting at home, hungry, when I had a sudden craving for cauliflower cheese soup. I looked in the kitchen and, low and behold, we had cauliflower, cream of cheddar soup, and chicken broth. And so it began.

I looked up a recipe on the Internet, tweaked it a bit to include the cheddar soup, and proceeded to make the best soup I've had in my life. My mother and sister, of course, were thrilled, and next time my mom went shopping she mysteriously ended up bringing home all of the necessary ingredients.

I dutifully looked up the recipe I had used before, but no matter how hard we searched, it couldn't be found. I tried an entirely different recipe and ended up with a soup hardly resembling the first one.

It couldn't have been a complete disaster, though, because my sister went out and bought more cauliflower, and the duty was given to me again to try and concoct a magnificent soup out of this underappreciated vegetable.

We've just finished it off, and I resolved that this time, the third recipe (I couldn't locate either of the previous two) would not be lost! E2 to the rescue! Here, for your viewing and tasting pleasure, is the third and equally good recipe. It's also exceedingly easy, which helps.

Recipe makes: Approximately 5 bowls
Prep time: Around 15 minutes
Cooking time: About 35 minutes

Ingredients

• 4 cups / 32 oz chopped cauliflower (This is approximate. More is good, but I wouldn't really recommend much less) chopped in about 1 cm cubes.
• One can cream of cheddar soup
• 4 tbsp / 2 oz butter (Or margarine)
• 1 minced small yellow onion (I used half a large white onion instead, so that works, too.)
• 2 tablespoons / 1 oz all-purpose flour (Or pretty much any flour lying around, I'd bet)
• 2 cups / 16 oz chicken stock (replacable with vegetable stock, but I haven't tried it myself.)
• 1 cup / 8 oz milk (I used homo milk, but I'm sure whatever milk or cream you have would do the trick)
• 6 tbsp / 3 oz cream cheese (The original recipe uses cream cheese with garlic and herbs, but I just used the regular kind. Again, I'm sure almost any kind will do.)
• Optional grated cheese to taste (This wasn't in the recipe, and I didn't measure how much I put in, but it was probably 1-2 cups / 8-16 oz. I used marbled cheese (a mix of cheddar and mozzarella), but feel free to toss in whatever you've got.)

Method

1. Melt butter in a large pot.
2. Sauté onion on medium until tender (this should only take a couple minutes).
3. Add cauliflower and continue to sauté for another 2 minutes or so.
4. Sprinkle flour on and sauté for another minute.
5. Add stock and stir until combined.
6. Cover and cook on medium heat until cauliflower is tender (This should take around 15 minutes. The bigger the chunks of cauliflower, the longer it'll take to cook). I just used tinfoil, but remember to watch out for the steam when you lift the cover. (Yes, I now know from experience.)
7. Add milk, cream cheese, and grated cheese.
8. Stir for about 10 minutes until combined. Make sure there are no chunks of cream cheese hidden. Add salt and any other spices you like to taste.
9. If you let it sit with the heat off, it should thicken (Though it'll also develop a skin on top). If, however, the smell is driving you mad and you're really hungry, it'll still taste great without the wait. (But you might burn your tongue.)

Like I said, this is a very simple recipe, so it can be altered drastically. I've heard substituting almost any other vegetable will still work (But that's without the grated cheese, I believe), and I'm sure it'll stand up to a lot of experimenting. If you have any success in an alteration of this recipe, please /msg me and I'll add it here so other everythingians can enjoy it, too.