Wedge Salad and Curried Carrot Soup

Let me start by saying that I LOVE wedge salads! One of my favorite local restaurants has a wedge salad on their menu and I order it every single time I dine there (which is quite often). I've never made one at home so I thought this would be the perfect time to try! I really wanted to make this wedge salad my own so I decided to make the blue cheese dressing myself. I found the recipe on EatingWell.com.

Since I seem to be on a soup kick lately, I decided to make another soup. I've haven't used curry in any of my cooking so far but I love the flavor so this Curried Carrot Soup caught my eye. I found this recipe at MarthaStewart.com.

I paired a light red wine with this dinner, Peachy Canyon “Incredible Red” Zinfandel. Another discovery out of Paso Robles, that is fantastic. Can be paired with almost any food, it is light enough to drink with a salad and soup or can stand up to a steak. Excellent with a variety of foods and one of my favorite go-to wines!

Recipes:

Blue Cheese Dressing for Wedge Salad

1/3 cup reduced-fat mayonnaise
1/3 cup nonfat buttermilk, or nonfat milk
1/3 cup nonfat plain yogurt
2 tablespoons tarragon vinegar, or white vinegar
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground pepper
¼ cup crumbled blue cheese (1 ounce)

1. Whisk mayonnaise, buttermilk (or milk), yogurt, vinegar, mustard, salt and pepper in a medium bowl until smooth. Add cheese and stir, mashing with spoon until the cheese is incorporated.
   

Curried Carrot Soup
2 tablespoons butter
1 cup chopped onion
1 teaspoon curry powder
Coarse sald and ground pepper
3 ½ cups reduced-sodium chicken broth
2 pounds carrots, peeled and cut into 1-inch chunks
1-2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons coarsely chopped fresh cilantro, for garnish (optional)

1. Heat butter in a large pot over medium heat. Add onion, curry powder, 2 teaspoons salt, and ¼ teaspoon pepper. Cook, stirring occasionally, until onion is soft, about 5 minutes.
2. Add broth, and 3 cups water; bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer until carrots are tender, about 20 minutes.
   
3. In a blender, puree soup in batches until smooth; transfer to a clean saucepan. Add more wather to thin to desired consistency. Reheat, if necessary. Stir in lemon juice.
   

A couple notes:

I love the flavor of blue cheese. In my opinion, this recipe could use a tiny bit less Dijon mustard and a little more blue cheese. The blue cheese crumbles were also a bit hard to mash so I suggest leaving them out on the counter for a few minutes to help them soften before adding them into the mixture.

The Curried Carrot Soup was much more sweet that I originally anticipated. The curry powder offered great flavor but I would have liked a little more kick. If you like some heat, adding red pepper flakes to this recipe should do the trick!

Enjoy!