Ingredients
- 1 lb ground beef
- 1 to 2 tsps vegetable oil
- 1 ½ cups chopped onion
- 1 cup chopped celery
- 1 cup diced carrots
- ½ teaspoon dried basil
- 3 medium potatoes peeled and cubed
- 4 cups chicken broth
- 4 tbsps butter
- ⅓ cup all purpose flour
- 12 oz cheddar cheese shredded
- 1 tsp kosher salt or to taste
- ¼ tsp black pepper
- 2 – 3 strips of bacon cooked and crumbled
- Fresh, chopped parsley
Instructions
- Heat half of the vegetable oil in a Dutch oven or large saucepan over medium heat.
- Add the ground beef and cook until the meat is no longer pink (5 min or so). Remove it with a slotted spoon and set aside.
- Add the onion, celery, carrots, and dried basil to the pan, (add more vegetable oil if necessary) and cook for about 3 to 5 minutes (until the onion is translucent).
- Add the beef back to the pan along with the taters, basil, and chicken broth.
- Bring it all to a rip, roarin' boil the lower the heat, cover the pan, and simmer for 15 minutes (make sure those potatoes are tender).
- While that is going down, grab a separate saucepan and over medium-low heat, melt the butter. Add the flour and cook, whisking like a crazy person for a few minutes.
- Add the roux the soup once it simmered properly.
- Bring the soup back to a boil and continue to cook for a few minutes.
- Add the cheese and half-and-half to the soup, reducing the heat to low. Taste and add salt and pepper along with the parsley. 10. Continue to until the cheese melts and the soup is hot. nSeason with salt, pepper, and parsley to taste.
- Splop the soup into bowls and garnish with the cooked crumbled bacon.
- EAT IT!!
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!
Brian Gerard (Lewandowski) writes books critics call "aggressively adequate" — better than "aggressively terrible" but somehow more concerning, like a smoke detector that only goes off on Tuesdays.
He once traded a MetroCard for a pitchfork on a subway platform and now uses it exclusively for dramatic pointing. He lives on a farm outside Charlottesville, Virginia with a partner who smiles politely at his life choices, a pig named Trouble McFussbucket who has opinions about the sofa, and a five-pound dog named Professor Archibald Pickles who appears to be held together entirely by anxiety and unearned confidence.
See his Amazon author page and buy his books before he spends the royalties on the pig.
Inheriting absurdism from Vonnegut and Adams and weaponized failure from Moore, he writes about conflicted everymen stumbling through supernatural chaos. He has published "Not Bukowski" and "Slop and Swill from a Festering Mind," and has two new novels seeking a publisher: "Truth Tastes Like Pennies" (available to paid Substack subscribers June 1) and "Elliot Nessie."
He remains unconvinced that birds aren't surveillance drones.
More biographical lies...err...info.
He once traded a MetroCard for a pitchfork on a subway platform and now uses it exclusively for dramatic pointing. He lives on a farm outside Charlottesville, Virginia with a partner who smiles politely at his life choices, a pig named Trouble McFussbucket who has opinions about the sofa, and a five-pound dog named Professor Archibald Pickles who appears to be held together entirely by anxiety and unearned confidence.
See his Amazon author page and buy his books before he spends the royalties on the pig.
Inheriting absurdism from Vonnegut and Adams and weaponized failure from Moore, he writes about conflicted everymen stumbling through supernatural chaos. He has published "Not Bukowski" and "Slop and Swill from a Festering Mind," and has two new novels seeking a publisher: "Truth Tastes Like Pennies" (available to paid Substack subscribers June 1) and "Elliot Nessie."
He remains unconvinced that birds aren't surveillance drones.
More biographical lies...err...info.
Latest posts by Brian Gerard (Lewandowski) (see all)
- Never Worry About Real Estate Taxes Again - May 13, 2026
- Dear Brian: A Rejection Anthology - May 12, 2026
- KUMQUAT: A Sleep Study - May 8, 2026
