Slow Cooker Chicken Pot Pie Soup and Bahamian Johnny Cake

Yes, another soup entry.  IT'S COLD OUT HERE, PEOPLE!  Fortunately, there is no lack of delicious soup recipes online and they're all a lot of fun to try out.  Another tasty one we made lately is Slow Cooker Chicken Pot Pie Soup.

As with many slow cooker soup recipes, we were attracted to this one because it has basic ingredients and not too much prep work.  We were also intrigued by the thought of enjoying the flavor of chicken pot pie without the not-quite-as-healthy pastry topping.

We followed the recipe to the letter.  The dish looks festive and colorful even before it starts cooking!

Then, in our constant effort to incorporate leafy greens we added some kale toward the end of the cooking time.

The end result was quite tasty and very filling on a cold winter night.  The potatoes really soak up a lot of the liquid, so next time we may add more of the condensed soup.  We also noticed that the addition of kale did lead to a slightly bitter aftertaste.  So if you want to stay true to the chicken pot pie flavors, skip the kale.  But if you don't mind altering the taste just a bit in the name of nutrition, go for it!

You may have spotted a small square of bread at the corner of the plate.  Good eye!  That is our first attempt at making bread from scratch!  Thanks to cold weather comfort food cravings (that should be deemed a legit condition), lately Mel has been remembering the taste of this amazing bread her grandmother used to make.  Her dad does not know the recipe or remember what his mother used to call it, but suggested looking up "Johnny Cake" recipes.  After some searching, this recipe for Bahamian Johnny Cake seemed to have ingredients that could possibly create the flavor Mel remembers.

Mel finds baking a bit intimidating because you have to be very precise with measuring ingredients.  With cooking, you can add a little more of this or that to correct for a seasoning mistake.  But with baking, too much or too little of one thing can mean back to the drawing board.  So she very carefully followed every step, first mixing the dry ingredients of flour, cornmeal, sugar, salt, and baking powder...

then adding the wet ingredients of oil and milk to create a dough that could be kneaded and spread into a baking dish.

 

After baking until golden brown, the bread actually did look similar to Mel's grandmother's.  However, the flavor wasn't quite a match.  It was good in it's own right though - a lighter cornbread which went well with the soup.  DJ loved it! 

But Mel is still determined to keep trying until she can recreate the flavor and texture she remembers.  We speculated that the missing ingredient could be lard, an old-school kitchen staple.  Mel's grandmother used it often, and it would account for the denser, saltier flavor of her bread.  Mr. B is going to try to see if his cousin remembers a recipe.  We'll keep you posted!