Something to Try

I love looking for recipes online.  Though I've used Google as my cookbook for the last few years, I find myself searching more often these days.  Typically, I use this approach when I have some ingredient to use up and after I've looked in my favorite cookbooks to no avail.  Type in whatever ingredients you have (say, peppers and ancho chiles) and you get a multitude of interesting or not-so-interesting recipes.  I usually search for the ones that include ingredients that I already have on hand so I don't have to make another run to the grocery store.

Last night, I had some pork shoulder that needed to be used up along with some orange and yellow bell peppers.  My usual leftover reincarnation is enchiladas of some sort, but the boys never eat enchiladas and I felt more like a soup. And I had just read an article about the health benefits of tumeric.  Everything in my cookbooks was kind of ordinary, so I started searching.

This is what I found... Cuchuco de Cebada. A yummy, light soup that had a little different taste than a typical stew:

http://www.mycolombianrecipes.com/cuchuco-de-cebada-colombian-barley-and-pork-soup

I had virtually everything on hand, except for the spice blend "sazon goya with achiote" and cabbage.  (But that's the gracious thing about soup is you can use whatever veggies you've got already!)  You may notice that "tumeric" isn't actually in the recipe, so maybe my search got off track.  However, thanks to Google again, a search for substitutions for the mystery spice blend delivered.  Half tumeric and half paprika with a little chile or red pepper flakes to boost the heat.  A close equivalent that worked for me!

Since the recipe was of Colombian origin, I channeled Sofia Vergara and imagined pairing the soup with little baby cheeses.  (Sorry I couldn't resist.)