Here in Spring, Texas - it's been a bit of a crazy time as of late. Wildfires all around us. Literally going outside to the smell and haze of smoke. People are losing homes, livestock, pets, belongings. It's sickening. With no rain in sight, I feel helpless....as do so many others.
The Texas fires could (and can) be seen from outer space.
True-color image taken by NASA's Aqua satellite of the the fires burning near Austin, Texas on September 5, 2011. Image credit: NASA.
We've also finally got some cooler temps this week. Waking up to 50 degree weather has been a God send. It's been wonderful not feeling the 115 degree heat index beating down on me just on the walk from the office building to my car, then a car trip home in a car that's hot enough to bake bread in. UGH!
So, yesterday I felt in a soup mood. I also felt in the mood to go through some frozen veggies we had lingering in the freezer. It felt like a Clean Out The Fridge Soup day.
I had peas, broccoli, yellow squash from the freezer. Tomatoes and brown rice from the pantry. Toss in some frozen homemade broth, seasonings, lemon zest and herbs leftover from this years basil and thyme plants. Voila.
I want to stop for a second and talk about rice. We've stopped eating white rice a while ago. We know brown is just better for you. It's way more hardy to stand up in soups than white rice any day. If you toss in white rice with a soup - you better be prepared to eat every last spoonful of that soup within twenty minutes of it being made. If not, it turns to MUSH. I used to make white rice separate from the soup, then ladle in rice and ladle in soup into bowls. Whatever. SO over it now. Brown rice is so hardy that even the next day, eating leftover soup (as I just did) it holds it's shape, taste and consistency very well.
Ok. Anyway - I boiled some leftover frozen stock I made (who knows when) with some extra water and seasonings and tossed in about 2 1/2 cups of rice. I boiled the rice for about 35 minutes or so and then added all my veggies and seasoned again and let that all cook for about another 20 minutes.
I apologize for the photo - as I said, I was not planning on blogging this, so it was taken with my cell phone in mid-munchage. *Correction - my daughter, Jessa, took this photo because she's awesome she reminded me.*
It was delicious. Devine. Delovely. And now, de-gone. I saved enough for two lunch leftovers for me and my monkee and the mister has a leftover bowl in the fridge as well. I think I may tell him to add some Tabasco or salsa in his....God that sounds awesome.
