Cream of Anything Soup - Use to substitute for Cream Soups in Casseroles, this recipe is not really designed for eating on its own. This is really just another white sauce. This recipe may used when the texture/flavor of the final product really matters, the quality of ingredients is important (no additives, control sodium) or you don’t have any canned soup in the house.
Image via Wikipedia
The cost is less than a canned soup at the store at regular price, however on sale with a good coupon, canned soup is hard to beat in pricing alone. (The last time I bought canned soup, it was on sale for $.80 and I bought two for a total of $1.60. My store was doubling coupons and I had a “buy two get one dollar off” coupon – my total cost was a $.40 credit toward the rest of my bill. I can’t always get that pricing, though.)
The cost for this version is, in October 2010: .22 for the milk ($1.98 per gallon) .10 for the butter ($1.49 per pound) Flour is negligible, flavoring varies – probably a few cents. Total: 37 cents.
Cream of Anything Soup, a substitute for one can of canned
- 2 T Butter
- 2 T Flour
- 1 3/4 cups skim milk (per my pledge)
- salt and pepper
- Celery or Mushrooms, sautéed, or chicken base.
Melt butter in saucepan over medium low heat and blend in flour. Cook, stirring constantly for about 2 minutes. Blend in milk and cook, stirring, until thickened. Add salt and pepper to taste. Add sautéed mushrooms for Cream of Mushroom, sautéed Celery for Cream of Celery, and a little chicken base for Cream of Chicken.
Note of the flavorings: If you are planning on using this in a casserole with other ingredients and vegetables, you’ll want to determine if you even need to add any additional flavoring to this white sauce. If your casserole already has mushroom or celery, for instance, it would just be silly to saute up a separate amount for this sauce. If you’re already using chicken broth as an ingredient, you won’t need to flavor this with any additional chicken base.
Nutrition:
- Per Recipe: 416 Calories; 24g Fat (51.4% calories from fat); 17g Protein; 34g Carbohydrate; 1g Dietary Fiber; 70mg Cholesterol; 490mg Sodium. Exchanges: 1 Grain(Starch); 0 Vegetable; 1 1/2 Non-Fat Milk; 4 1/2 Fat.
Nutrition for a Can of Cream of Mushroom Soup:
- Note: the can clearly states 50 percent calories are from fat, but their fat does not add up to an expected amount. (I find that very strange.)
- Per Can: 250 Calories; 15g Fat (50 percent calories from fat), 2.5g Protein; 22.5g Carbohydrate;12.5mg Cholesterol;1740mg Sodium.
Put Your Own Spin on It: You could get by with a little less butter, or use oil like the canned variety to change out the calorie count. If the taste of the final product isn’t dependent upon the soup, just skip a step and use the recipe as a white sauce, omitting the vegetables.
My PayOff: Keep in mind that much of the calorie content from the homemade version is from the milk – something the canned variety has less than 2 percent of according to their can. I can also be certain that my family isn’t eating msg or strange preservatives, both found in the ingredients on the canned soup.
