Marnie says "This is a blog post I never thought I would be writing." Leftovers? It happened that I had a small piece of raw haddock in my freezer and a few of Marsden's lovely little whole scallops, shucked and gutted, and extra, also in the freezer. I made a lovely spur of the moment casserole dish which turned out to be so delicious that I wished I had take a photo of it for this blog.
However, the next day I made this soup or call it a chowder or bisque, whichever, it was so good I have to share the secret. I cooked orzo, the rice grain-shaped pasta, but I could just as well have used a thin spaghetti, any pasta that cooks in under 10 minutes. I used just enough water for the job and dropped in the frozen fish to cook simultaneously. I also added a bit of raw chopped onion and a generous handful of diced celery and its leaves. When the pasta was just done, instead of draining the cooking liquid I poured in the thawed scallop juices and I set this broth aside. Then I added to the cooked pasta and fish the thawed scallops, a handful of dried kelp bits, a dash of oregano, some sliced black olives ... and cream of celery soup straight from the can and treated it like any casserole with a bit of heating in the oven.
The next day the couple of spoons of leftover casserole thinned with the reserved cooking liquid a bit of milk made one of the most glorious soups I have ever had. I had some greens that I had cooked as a side dish for the casserole dinner so I threw them in too. Yes, this soup was almost embarrassingly thrifty, simple, and full of shortcuts. But it was wonderful. Try cooking some seafood in your pasta and using the resulting liquid along with canned soups with their commercial stabilizers. What a trick; what a partnership!
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