Chickpea & Kale Soup

Without a doubt, one of the best parts of my job is getting to cook everyday; the downside being that I'm not cooking for myself and I don't get to eat the fruits of my labors--But that's a minor detail. Unfortunately my everyday life has become so busy that cooking is a luxury often relegated to the weekends. However cooking is a *requirement* for work, and with open-minded adventurous eaters, I couldn't be happier.

I think of the work kitchen as my test kitchen, a place I can buy unusual ingredients and try out new recipes with abandon, and with the goal of improving my skills and building my recipe resume. When you have dreams of opening a restaurant someday, there could be no better situation; unless of course I was independently wealthy and able to bypass that whole "job" thing, but that's not the case.

One of my proudest accomplishments in the test kitchen is begin to perfect the art of Soup. Soup is something my Gran always fell back on for a simple supper, but it seemed so elusive and down-right difficult to me. I now see what she was talking about all those years, and darn I wish I could re-live our conversations about Soup and take notes!

For supper the other night I decided to try a simple Chickpea & Kale soup I adapted from a recipe I found online. The good news if you don't like chickpeas or kale is that their flavors can easily be toned down by simply pureeing the soup as a final step before serving. In this way the flavors just meld together and become nice and creamy. Yum!!

I'm not strict on recipes, so the loose guidelines are below...

Saute:
-2 medium onions, a couple stalks of celery and a couple tablespoons of garlic for 10ish minutes until they are soft & fragrant.
Add:
-10 to 12 Roma tomatoes roughly chopped and turn up the heat cooking for another 10ish minutes until the tomatoes have broken down and become juicy.
Add:
6 or so cups of chopped kale, 2 large boxes of vegetable broth (or chicken/beef broth if you don't desire a vegetarian soup) and 2 drained cans of chickpeas.
Season:
with salt & pepper, thyme, herbs de Provence and a little paprika for some zip. Simmer for 40 minutes or until the kale is tender and the flavor has come together nicely.

If you like your soup broth-y you can leave it as is. Alternately, you can partially or wholly puree the soup with an immersion blender to create a creamier version.