Yay, I Made Good Soup!

I made a successful concoction for dinner last night. It's a rare thing. Usually I have to follow a recipe. I decided I wanted to make a homemade soup using yams. Why not, since you can make potato soup, right? I did look online after I bought a few ingredients to find yam soup recipes do indeed exist, and I used the spices they mentioned to make the soup extra tasty. Here's my recipe that makes about 5 servings.

Ginger's Ginger Yam Soup
2 large yams (Sweet potatoes? The ones with the dark orange skin.)
4 stalks of celery
2/3 cup of onions
1/2 teaspoon ginger
A pinch of cayenne pepper
Salt and fresh ground pepper to taste*

Dice everything up. Throw it in a pot of water. Wait until it's done. I put the yams in first to give them a little more time to cook; add everything else after 5 minutes.

* To taste. Therein lies the key. I rarely taste soup while I making it, because for one thing it's hot! B and I were watching a cooking show and the judges are forever reprimanding the chefs for not tasting their food before they present it. A lightbulb went off in my head, and I gave it a shot. Lo and behold, it was my best soup ever.

True to form, I don't like to leave well enough alone, so I've got some variations in mind like using fresh ginger or pureeing part or all of the soup next time. B said he likes it chunky though. I may like to take a cup out and puree it with milk and then put it back in to thicken it up. Also I may try a vegetable or chicken broth base. Mess it up real good.

I also made paninis to go with it, and those came out well, too. We are always ordering them at our favorite coffee shop so I kind of followed theirs: turkey, roasted red peppers, fresh mozzarella and a light amount of balsamic vinaigrette dressing. I had a spectacular episode with the dressing. It had one of those safety seals on it and so after I took it off, I started shaking up the bottle not realizing I'd also loosened the cap. Dressing Hell to breakfast. On my shoulder and dripping down the arm of my shirt, on the cupboards, on the George Forman grill, the full length of the counter and all over the floor. I didn't even curse it was so phenomenal. I have mopped the floor three times and a I swear it's still got a slight greasiness to it. I've washed my shirt twice, and it still smells like the dressing!  Potent organic health-food dressing.