Fried potato soup - a recipe for a creamy comfort-food favorite

Potato soup is hard to beat, particularly on days when its cold outside and something hearty and comforting sounds just right.  This classic comfort food can be absolutely fantastic, however, with the addition of just a few ingredients and techniques, which are detailed below the recipe.  For classic's sake, though, what comes next is the proper recipe including only one minor variation: the inclusion of some fried potato home-fries to add some complexity to both the texture and the flavor.

The presented recipe is also the vegetarian version.  For meat lovers, see the variations and suggestions at the bottom of the article for some great suggestions on how to make this fantastic soup even better!  The given recipe makes four full bowls or six lighter ones and takes about an hour to make, start to finish.

Ingredients:

1. Four relatively large baking potatoes, peeled and cut into half-inch cubes, though this need not be exact;
2. Two cups of whole milk;
3. One cup of half-and-half (substitute whole milk for a somewhat lighter soup and cream for a significantly heavier soup);
4. One half of a large sweet onion;
5. Three to six cloves of garlic, to taste, crushed and finely chopped;
6. Salt and pepper, to taste;
7. Approximately one stick of butter;
8. 1 tbsp olive oil for frying;
9. Approximately 2 ounces of Colby cheese, freshly grated.

Directions:

1. In a large pot of salted water, boil all but a handful of the potatoes until fork-tender.
2. Meanwhile, in a nonstick skillet, fry the remaining potato and about a fourth of the onion and half of the garlic in olive oil until they are fork-tender and golden brown on the outsides.  Turn off this pan and let the potatoes rest until the boiling potatoes finish boiling.
3. When the potatoes have finished boiling, drain them well and set them aside.
4. Melt the butter in the pot and once it has melted and started to cook a little, add the onions and cook them until they're just translucent (4-5 minutes).
5. Add the garlic and cook for 1-2 more minutes.
6. Add both batches of the potatoes, some salt, some pepper, the milk, and the half-and-half and mix well.
7. Bring the mixture up to a soft boil and then add the cheese in small batches, stirring well between each.  This step in the process thickens the soup and provides a starchy character to the cream mixture that great potato soup begs for.
8. Serve hot, garnished with any of your favorite toppings: more cheese, bacon, finely chopped chives or parsley, or even a dollop of sour cream or plain yogurt.

Variations and suggestions:

• Omit half of the butter and the olive oil and replace it with the fat of the four slices of thick-cut bacon.  This is best accomplished by cooking the bacon in the skillet that you intend to fry the potatoes in, removing the bacon, frying the fried potatoes as usual, and then adding bacon, chopped into small pieces, back into the soup at the last minute.
• Cut up some country ham into small pieces and add them to the pot with the milk and half-and-half.  This will simulate ham-hock in a quick soup.
• Add red pepper flakes or chipotle pepper flakes (for a smoky, extra-gourmet, slightly Southwestern touch) for extra depth of flavor.  Don't use too much.  The goal is not to make "spicy potato soup," which, for the record, isn't that good.  This is another great place to "indiscriminately toss smoked paprika" around.
• Substitute your favorite cheese in place of Colby.  Jack, Cheddar, and even hot-pepper cheeses are all quite good, as is the fancy stuff like the Drunken Goat.  Think about the flavor of the cheese before you add it and try to avoid using anything too strongly flavored.  This is potato soup.
• Fry more (or all) of the potatoes or all of the onion if you like the somewhat caramelized taste it provides.
• Bake the potatoes instead of boiling them, which takes a bit longer but provides a different texture and flavor to the soup.
• Copy my mom and add cut-up green beans to the soup if you like them.  Use either fresh or frozen ones and add them with the milk so they don't overcook.  This gives the soup a nice summer variant that takes advantage of the gifts of backyard gardens.
• Thinly slice some chicken breasts across the grain (less than 1/4 inch if possible) and brown it in the pot before adding the potatoes and milk.

Buy these ingredients locally at essentially any local-area grocery store.  A great Knoxville dairy for the milk for this recipe is Cruze Farms (see their blog at this link).  Consider using their milk.  There's a definite difference to the flavor.  It can be purchased at many mom-and-pop groceries and fruit markets as well as at food co-ops in the Knoxville area.  One such fruit market is Horn of Plenty Marketplace on West Broadway in Maryville.

For more great recipes and cooking ideas, follow the Knoxville Gourmet Food Examiner by subcribing at the top of the page. You can also read more on his personal cooking blog: The Untrained Gourmet.