Ward Halloween Party

On Saturday our ward had a Harvest cook-off, then a trunk-or-treat. Although we didn't dress up, we did enter a soup and a pie into the competition. I'll admit that I wasn't very interested in cooking Saturday, so I only did a few things. Nick did the bulk of the baking.

Nick was also a judge for the chili contest. Here are the other judges with their cups of chili.

Our friends the Finlaysons came as workout Ken and Barbie (too bad I cut her out of the shot), and the Ehlers were Red Riding Hood and a SF Giants player (he had the beard, but it interfered with the food tasting).

The surprise of the night was that out of about 15 soups entered, we took FIRST PLACE!!
Sadly, the experimental strawberry-cranberry pie didn't have time to set up and was pretty runny, but it still tasted great.

Here is the recipe for the award-winning Potato Ham soup!

As with most soup recipes, it's pretty forgiving. You can put in more or less of the ingredients, or add something of your own if you'd like. We prefer it a bit on the spicy side, so we usually add plenty of black pepper.

3 1/2 cups peeled, diced potatoes
1/3 cup diced celery
1/3 cup sliced carrots
1/3 cup finely chopped onion
3/4 cup diced cooked ham
3 1/4 cups water
2 Tbsp. chicken bullion
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. ground pepper

5 Tbsp. butter
5 Tbsp. flour
2 cups milk

1. Combine the potatoes, celery, carrots, onion, ham and water in a stock pot. Bring to a boil, then cook over medium heat until potatoes are tender (about 10-15 minutes). Stir in the chicken bullion, salt and pepper.

2. In a separate sauce pan, melt butter over medium-low heat. Whisk in flour with a fork and cook, stirring constantly until thick. Slowly stir in milk as not to allow lumps to form. Continue stirring over medium-low heat until thick.

3. Stir the white sauce into the stock pot and cook soup until heated through.