Clean the Pantry Swamp Soup

Welcome back to the ATS kitchen, friends. I’ve been living in the Louisiana Delta long enough to know we may have a few more cold days before this thing warms up for good. Here’s one of my great old standby soup recipes. Stock the ingredients now and keep the recipe handy. It’ll be a nice treat for the family during one of those season ending cold snaps.

• One can each of: Cream of Celery, Cream of Broccoli, Cream of Mushroom, Cream of Potato, Cream of Onion, Cream of Chicken
• Two soup cans of evaporated milk
• 1/2 cup chopped onion
• 1/2 cup bell pepper
• Half stick of butter
• Three eight ounce rolls garlic cheese
• Three eight ounce rolls jalapeno cheese (or Mexican Velvetta!)

We’ll begin by sautéing our onions and peppers in a bit of butter. When they’re clear, we’ll add our preferred meat. If you’ve got chicken, use chicken. Shrimp, crab, crawfish—whatever you’ve got, folks. I’ve diced up four grilled chicken breasts for us to toss in today. We’ll put our veggies in a big boiler and add the evaporated milk along with our soup cans: cream of celery, chicken, mushroom, potato, and onion. (By the way, try using the low-sodium variety on those cans. It’s better for you and you won’t miss the flavor.) Now, we’ll cut up eighteen ounces each of garlic roll cheese and jalapeno roll cheese, add it to the pot and bring the heat up slowly.

That’s it. Let it simmer on the stove until it’s heated through and through—- or until the family is banging on the table, whichever comes first. This makes a big old pot, friends! Salt and pepper to taste and serve with your favorite hot bread!