A Soup Kind of Day

It's been that kind of day. After working hard Thursday and Friday getting our booth set up, we settled in Friday evening to watch the snow fall. Yesterday we tried to get motivated to get something done, but it never worked out--both of us were just plain tired! I had a small performance last night too, that I needed to get ready for.

So we watched the snow, piddled around and then left for Charleston in the evening--thankfully the snow had stopped. And what had been predicted as 4-7" of the white stuff only ended up amounting to 3 inches here on the ridge and about an inch elsewhere. Big letdown after all the hype! But up here, it was beautiful and it was nice to see after such a snow-less winter.

Today we got to work. The house was a mess after all that moving of stuff; there was hardly a flat surface clear for sitting. So we worked on picking up and putting away before moving on to other projects. My main project today was paper--sorting out receipts from last year and getting them filed. I had been pretty good about keeping up with them until the fall, then I got so busy I just let them pile up. It's amazing how much paper can accumulate. Now I have them all rough-sorted for the storytelling part of my life; the household part is organized and filed away. Tomorrow I will tackle the storytelling receipts and get them into the spreadsheet. And call an accountant to set up an appointment. There is just too much involved with our taxes for last year to attempt to do them myself this time. Next year, I think I can get back to doing it alone, but with retirement and the land sale it just gets complicated.

I took a break in filing to make soup. It was definitely a soup kind of day and I had a hankering for a soup with barley--and tomatoes. What I ended up making was Tomato-Turkey-Barley Soup with cornbread.  Here's the basic recipe:

Tomato, Turkey, and Barley Soup
1 quart canned tomatoes
3 cups water (or more, depending on how thick you like your soup)
3 cups cooked turkey, cut into small pieces
1/4 cup dried celery leaves
1/2 cup chopped celery
1 medium onion, chopped
1 tablespoon dried parsley leaves
1/2 teaspoon dried chopped garlic, or 2 cloves, chopped
3 chicken bouillon cubes
1 tsp hot sauce
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp ground black pepper
1 cup pearl barley

Turn on the stove; pour the canned tomatoes into a 4-quart or larger pot and add the water. Add all the est of the ingredients to the pot in the order listed. Cook for about 45 minutes, or until the barley is tender and ready to eat.

I served this with yellow cornbread and pumpkin butter. It was a feast, perfect for a cold winter's day. There's enough left for tomorrow too. Now that just makes me happy. You can find my cornbread recipe here and my pumpkin butter recipe here--both so simple to make and so good, especially together.