Mulligatawny.

I don't know what it is... but it seems I'm often inspired to cook soup on Sunday nights. I guess on Sundays I just love snuggling in and spending the evening wrapped up in a blanket on my comfy couch as I prepare myself for another work week. You know what goes great with couch sitting and blanket snuggling? Soup. Yes, yes it does. And I think my favorite soup to make is a variation of Pioneer Woman's Mulligatawny. My friend Jessie actually made it first and gave me her alterations. I pretty much use her recipe but have done a few things to make it a little less healthy and a tiny bit more perfect for my gluttonous taste buds. Basically I added more chicken and brown sugar, and some rice. And I took out some of the spices that I don't have in my kitchen. Don't judge me... spices are expensive!

If you like curry, and you like soup, and you like me, you should try out this recipe. I love it. Hopefully you will, too!

Mulligatawany (Pioneer Woman's, then Jessie's, then mine)

Ingredients

-4 chicken breasts, cooked and cut into bite size pieces

-2 tbsp margarine

-1 large onion

-4 cloves garlic

-3 tbsp curry powder

-1/4 tsp cayenne pepper/ground red pepper (you can use more, I've just toned it down a lot for my Momma)

-46 oz. chicken broth (go for the fat free stuff, it'll make you feel better when you add all of the brown sugar below)

-4 carrots, cut into tiny pieces (or you can do big pieces but it'll take 5 years to cook)

-3 red potatoes, cut into tiny pieces (any potato will do, we just always seem to have red around)

-2 cups skim milk

-1/3 cup brown sugar

-2 tsp salt

-1/2 cup all-purpose flour

Optional Side

-1 cup jasmine or long grain rice (optional)

-2 cups water

-1 tsp salt

Directions

Cook the chicken somehow. (Because I'm lazy I generally just boil the chicken for 15-20 minutes while I'm working on the rest of the soup.) Melt the margarine in a large "soup sized" pot on medium heat. Chop up the garlic and dice the onions and add them to the margarine. Let the onions cook until they brown a bit, stirring them occasionally, about 5 minutes. When the onions are nice and brown add the curry and cayenne pepper and stir constantly for about 1 minute. Add the chicken broth, carrots, potatoes, and chicken (if you're like me and started boiling the chicken when you started your soup, the chicken probably isn't ready yet; it's cool to add it whenever it's ready.) Cook the soup until the carrots and potatoes are tender. I'd say about 20 minutes or so, it depends on how big you cut your carrots; PS I told you to cut them small, you slacker. When they're good and tender add 1 cup of the milk and the brown sugar and salt and let it simmer for about 5 minutes. In a separate bowl, combine the remaining cup of milk and the flour and whisk together until there are no lumps (I'm telling you, NO lumps, or you'll have nasty, cottage cheese looking things floating in your soup later, it's not pretty.) Add the milk/flour mixture to the soup and let it simmer for another 5 or 10 minutes. And you're done!

I like to eat the soup with a side of rice. Tonight I used the water that I used to boil the chicken with for my rice. It had to boil for 20 minutes so about 10 minutes into the "letting the carrots get soft" phase, I started my rice and they all finished at the same time.

And yes, your house will smell like curry for 3 days after making this. But it's worth it. I promise. (Above is Pioneer Woman's picture of her mulligatawny. Below is my beloved circular scarf that I knitted with mulligatawny colored yarn so I thought it'd be appropriate to show it off. You can also kind of see my bowl of soup. Hey, it's the best I can do! I'm no Pioneer Woman...)