Recipes on Top – Sublime Beer Cheese Soup (Mark II – Veggie Bomb)

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Ingredients:

• 1 lb smoked bacon, finely chopped
• 1 medium red onion cut into ¼ in pieces
• 1 package celery, chopped into chunks
• 1 package carrots, chopped into chunks
• 3 tablespoons all purpose flour
• 1 cup skim milk
• 4 cups chicken stock
• 4 oz grated white cheddar
• 3 dashes Tabasco sauce
• ½ tsp Worcestershire sauce
• ½ cup beer (preferably a dark Canadian), room temperature
• Salt and pepper to taste
• Bread of choice

Instructions:

1. Cook the bacon in a large soup pot over medium heat until lightly browned.
2. Add onions, celery, and carrots, and cook until the onion is tender.
3. Sprinkle in flour and stir constantly for 2 minutes. Stir in milk and stock, a little at a time, blending well to ensure there are no lumps. Bring to a boil, then cover and simmer for 15 minutes.
4. Remove from heat and whisk in cheese, Tabasco, Worcestershire sauce, and beer. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
5. Serve with your favorite bread. (I usually like French or Italian bread.)

Babble:
This variation of the Mark I came about because every time I made the Mark I, we basically ended up eating a whole block of cheese in one sitting – and while our taste buds very much enjoyed that, our guts did not. Also, when I cook, I generally like to use complete packages of whatever I ingredients buy just so I don’t have to store them (i.e. forget about them and find them moldy and mutating in the back of the fridge months later). 
Thus, to make a less overwhelming soup, I significantly cut the amount of cheese involved and then restored the soup’s heft with added bacon and vegetables. It’s far from a healthy soup – after all, we went from eating a whole block of cheese in one sitting to a whole pack of bacon in one sitting – but it’s certainly yummy as heck.