Goodbye, my Sam

I'm beyond heartbroken.  My Samantha passed away last week.  It was very unexpected and sudden.  She was here one day and gone the next.  For that I am very grateful.  I would not have wanted her to suffer.  We still don't know the cause as she slipped away so fast and at that point extensive testing would have caused her undue discomfort.  She was such a sweet and loving girl, who gave us so much joy in her 12 years with us.  I know she felt loved everyday.

Broccoli cheese soup

I love broccoli cheese soup but never made it because I thought it was hard...until today.  I found a recipe on Pinterest that looked promising from this blog

I pretty much followed it except that I added chicken bouillon to my veggie stock because it was too bland and the only other spices I used were pepper, garlic and onion powders.  I used one handful of shredded Mexican cheese blend and one handful of sharp Cheddar cheese.

32 oz vegetable broth
1 bunch of broccoli, chopped including stems (peel stem if very fibrous)
1 cup shredded or diced carrots
1 diced small onion
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 bay leaf
2 tsp chicken bouillon

In large pot (5-6 qt.), add all above ingredients and simmer until veggies are tender but not mushy.

In a small saucepan, make roux by melting 4 Tbsp butter and whisking in 4 Tbsp flour until completely blended and just barely turns darker.  Remove from heat.

To the roux, add 2 cups of the broth from the veggies and whisk until smooth.  Add mixture back into veggie/broth pot and bring to a low boil to thicken soup.

To the pot add 1 cup heavy cream and heat through.  Lower heat and finally add 1 handful of shredded sharp Cheddar and 1 handful of shredded Mexican blend cheese.  Make sure that you don't bring to a boil after cheese is added.