Easy Slow Cooker Potato Soup

Hello again, everyone!  I hope you've all had a pleasant week... and a half.  Mine was quite busy - but I successfully managed to make it through turning in a monster appellate brief and oral argument, all with a hideous head cold.  Success!  Surviving that means I made it to my glorious, lovely, wonderful spring break.  We kicked it off with a visit from my brother and his family this last weekend.  It was lots of fun, but holy cow, 3 year old's are EXHAUSTING.  I'm now in recovery mode, after the headcold has returned for round two: horrendous cough.

Given that it's 3.14, and I am a nerd, I should probably be posting about pie today.  Alas, I'm sick enough that I won't be making much of anything today.  But here's a picture of a lovely apple pie to tide you over:

MMMMMmmm, 3.1415926535897...

Instead, I'm talking about soup today.  Two nights ago, Hubby had to head off to a church activity immediately after work, so dinner needed to be ready to eat right when he walked in the door.  To complicate matters, we share a car, so it had to be ready when we both walked in the door from me picking him up.  No time for last minute flourishes while he was on his way home.  Ergo, I opted for a crock-pot meal.  I know with it being "spring" and everything, some of you may be putting your crock pots away for the season, but here in South Bend, IN, it's 33 degrees and trying to snow.  So, mine is still going strong.

I remember when I was a little kid, my dad would make a smooth potato soup by mashing potatoes then adding onions, milk, broth, etc.  I'm not sure exactly what he put in that stuff, but it was one of my FAVORITE meals in the winter.  I love a good potato soup, so that's what I'm sharing today.  It's a recipe that I adopted from Slow Cooker Creamy Potato Soup on Allrecipes.com.  I actually discovered this last fall, and it quickly became a winner for Saturday dinners, especially on Notre Dame Football Game days.  Hubby and I would freeze all afternoon in the bleachers, then come home to this soup to warm us up.

Ingredients:

6 Slices bacon, cooked and crumbled
1 onion, finely chopped
1 (32 oz) box of chicken broth or stock
1 (14 oz) can of vegetable broth
4-5 large potatoes
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp dill weed
1/2 tsp fresh ground pepper

1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 (12 oz) can evaporated milk
2 cups half and half

Instructions:

1) Cook your bacon and remove from the pan, reserving the grease.  Or, if you're like me and buy pre-cooked bacon, you hold off on cooking it until near the end, then heat it in the microwave as usual.  You could also sub in "Real Bacon" bacon bits if you're in a hurry.

2) Use the bacon grease to fry your chopped onion just until it is tender - you don't want these to caramelize, unless you want brown,dirty looking soup (which I don't).  Once they are done, remove from heat and set aside.

Although I typically buy pre-cooked bacon, I do occasionally buy a few pounds of bacon to cook myself so I can save the grease.  I keep a mason jar of bacon grease in my fridge all the time - it keeps for a quite a while, as long as you let it cool to room temperature and solidify BEFORE you put it in the refrigerator, to avoid condensation.  If moisture mixes with the fat, it can go rancid.

These are DONE - just soft and translucent, not browning yet.

3) Next we turn to the potatoes, which are easily the most difficult/time consuming part of the recipe.  You'll need to peel and chop them into 1/4" to 1/2" cubes.  I like to give my potatoes a "rough peel," leaving some skin behind because I like a little bit in my soup.  Getting good cubes can be tricky.  I know many of you don't need a how-to on this front, but I would like to err on the safe side.  Here's how to get uniform cubes without chopping you fingers off:

Roughly peeled potatoes

Set the potato on its flattest side, and slice into discs between 1/4" and 1/2" thick.

Completely sliced

Separate the discs into two potato halves and lay on their flat side.

Slice through lengthwise, to create potato strips.  These are basically cut like french fries at this point.

Gather the strips into a stack you can hold onto.

Slice across one last time to create small cubes.

Ta Da!  Cubed.

4) Add the potatoes, onion, both broths, and the spices to the crock pot, and give it all a stir.  Then lid it, and cook on low approximately 5 hours or until the potatoes are cooked through.

Ready to cook.

5) About 30 minutes before you intend to eat, whisk together the flour and evaporated milk.  Stir the mixture into the crock pot, and add about half of the crumbled bacon, and as much of the half and half as the crock pot will hold.  (Sometimes mine gets a little too full with this recipe and I can't fit the full 2 cups).  Or, if the soup looks like it's getting too thick for your taste, only add about one cup of the half and half.  Cook for an additional 30 minutes on HIGH.  I did this step right before I left to go get Hubby, so it would be done when we returned.

6) When the soup is once again heated through, serve with a handful of bacon crumbles on top.  The soup will also need to be salted and peppered to taste, but I usually just let individuals season it in own bowls, because everyone's preferences are a little different.

That's all there is to it!  Give it a try, and let me know what you think.  It's nothing fancy, but I think it's a really nice, comforting, warms-you-through kind of meal.  Oh, and if you're feeling ambitious, go make a pie too!  Have a wonderful week, everyone.