Loaded Baked Potato Soup

The weather has finally started to cool down here and I thought it would be a great night to try out this recipe for Baked Potato soup. I really love baked potato soup. Safeway (or perhaps Vons in your area) sells a great version of it with their signature cafe soups. This one was pretty good, though I ended up altering it a bit as I was cooking. Here is the recipe from the website:

Ingredients

• 3 bacon strips, diced
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon dried basil
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper
• 3 cups chicken broth
• 2 large baked potatoes, peeled and cubed
• 1 cup half-and-half cream
• 1/2 teaspoon hot pepper sauce
• Shredded Cheddar cheese
• Minced fresh parsley

Directions

1. In a large saucepan, cook bacon until crisp. Drain, reserving 1 tablespoon drippings. Set bacon aside. Saute onion and garlic in the drippings until tender. Stir in flour, salt, basil and pepper; mix well. Gradually add broth. Bring to boil; boil and stir for 2 minutes. Add the potatoes, cream and hot pepper sauce; heat through but do not boil. Garnish with bacon, cheese and parsley. 

 I ended up leaving out the dried basil, the fresh parsley, and the hot pepper sauce, and I added about a half of a cup more of the chicken broth and an extra strip of bacon, cause you know, its bacon.

I cooked the bacon in my dutch oven pot, cooked the onions and garlic in the drippings, and mixed in the flour and broth. It was at this point that I actually read the list of ingredients and realized that it calls for cooked potato. Derp. So I cubed my uncooked potatoes and threw them in the pot. It came out just fine anyway. I also added about 3/4 cup of shredded cheddar cheese as I was mixing in the cream. I garnished the soup with more cheese, diced green onion, and bacon bits. Noms to the max. I think this will be a great recipe for chilly fall and winter nights.

 Also, I recommend pairing this soup with some kind of raw vegetable. I went with a spinach salad. Its such a rich, bacon-y, creamy soup that I really felt the need to have some kind of healthy vegetable with it so my arteries didn't immediately seize up.