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Jen LeBow’s Red Pepper Soup Recipe

My daughters LOVE this and it even freezes IF you omit  the cream.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

Toss in very large bowl:

3 pounds red bell peppers, cut into 1” wide strips

2 lbs. ripe plum tomatoes, cut into 1” pieces (or used canned and include the tomato juice)

3 medium carrots, cut into 1” pieces

2 large sweet onions, cut into 8 wedges

6 torn up basil leaves (or about 2 t dried)

3/4 t dried thyme

1 t paprika

Salt and pepper (go light/ you can always add when you taste it at the end)

6 T olive oil

Once well-combined, dump onto 2 foil-lined cookie sheets and spread out to avoid as much overlap as possible. Bake 45-50 minutes, turning every 15 minutes.

Prepare:

3 cups vegetable broth (I use the bullion paste plus water)

Once the vegetables are cool enough to handle, put about 1/3 of them into a food processor with 1 cup vegetable broth.  Repeat twice (for a total of 3 cups of broth and all the veggies).

Place all of the soup in a large bowl or pot.

Add & combine:

1 ½ T balsamic vinegar (reduced is best, but regular will do).  I go heavy on this step.

Optional: ¼ cup heavy cream, mixed thoroughly

Jen LeBow’s Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins

Let it be known that I am not a gadget person.  That said, there are few tools that I swear by.  One of them is silicone muffin cups.  I would never go back to a regular muffin tin because, even if you can get them all out without decapitating several of them, who wants to clean a muffin pan?  For this recipe, I use the mini muffin cups which are available on Amazon and several kitchen websites.  You certainly can make these using traditional metal muffin pans. One more thing: this is a “basic” muffin recipe which simply means that you can switch out the raspberries for another berry or for chocolate chips, or nuts—use your imagination.

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.  If you want regular size muffins, increase the oven temp to 425 degrees and they’ll probably need closer to 20 mintues.  (Most muffin recipes instruct you to use lower temperatures.  For a quick, great explanation of why a hotter oven makes better muffins, as well as a side by side photo that leaves no question about it, click here. )

In a standing mixer, cream:

1/3 cup softened, unsalted butter

1 1/4 cup sugar

Add:

2 eggs, one at a time, beating until well combined.

Add and beat until combined:

1/3 cup water

1 ½ cups mashed bananas (about 4 medium) (I peel them and put them in a Ziploc bag and vent my frustrations from the day to get them to the proper consistency.)

In a separate bowl, combine the dry ingredients:

1 2/3 cups all purpose flour

1 t baking soda

¼ t baking powder

¼ t salt

Stir in, by hand:

1 cup chocolate chips

Scoop batter into muffin cups so they are just under ¾ full. Place muffin cups on cookie sheet and bake 18 minutes.  Allow them to cool at least 10 minutes and then gently remove the muffins from the cups (you will be amazed at how easily they come out!).  Cool on a wire rack a couple of hours before sealing in an air-tight container.