Broccoli Cheese Soup {recipe}

Let me just say this: I love broccoli cheese soup. A lot. It is my favorite soup, behind mushroom and loaded potato and... you get the point. My hubby on the other hand, not so much. It's the cheese that doesn't sit well with him. So when I make this, it's mostly all for me. Except last week we had some friends over for dinner and the soup was gone by the end of the night. Should I say they liked it? Well, just a little. 

So this soup is, again, easy-peasy to make. Like most of my recipes. I try to bring you easy-to-make, home-made-but-taste-like-from-a-restaurant ideas for great meals.

The basis for my recipe comes from here, tweaked a little to my personal taste.

Ingredients:
1 lb fresh broccoli
4 oz sharp cheddar cheese
2 medium onions
4 oz Swiss cheese
3 medium carrots
1 quart chicken broth
1/2 cup of flour
2 cups of milk
3 tbsp butter
6 oz heavy cream
salt and pepper to taste

Peel and grate carrots, dice the onions and grate the cheeses. Set aside

Pour the chicken broth in a heavy bottom pot and put it on low heat to slowly warm up and add the carrots
Melt the butter in a non stick skillet and add diced onions. Cook together for 5 minutes on medium heat until the onions become translucent.

Take half of the onions and add them to the broth. Add flour to the rest of the onions in the pan and whisk together. Start adding milk very slowly, constantly whisking after every 1/4 of a cup until it forms a roux. Set aside.

Cut broccoli florets discarding the stems and put into a medium heatproof dish. Pour enough boiling water to cover and let stand for 1 minute. (you can't really wash broccoli too well, so the boiling water will remove all the germs and dirt and it will not end up in the soup) Drain broccoli and add to the broth. Next add the roux and heavy cream then stir everything.

Little by little add the cheese while keeping the heat on simmer (or it will stick to the pot if you heat it the boiling point. Tried it. Trust me. Had to soak the pot for 3 days)

Add salt and pepper to taste. (Make sure you taste it before adding salt as the broth and cheese will add quit a bit of salt. Careful not to over-salt it.)