Pumpkin soup

I've never been any kind of great cook. My mom is a great cook but (sorry mom) was not all that patient with me in the kitchen.....in all fairness I also had little to no interest in anything in there except for the insides of turkeys. Early childhood weirdness. But then I came here and got a new life where I'm home during the day, and so now I cook. People seemed to serve a lot of pumpkin soup around here in the fall, and I became an immediate fan. I got a general idea of how this was made, and started experimenting. I now crown myself the best pumpkin soup maker in all of Bavaria. I use a pressure cooker for speed and also because I don't want to boil the ingredients. And there is nothing fancy in this soup, just natural, fresh ingredients (well ok Mia, there are chemicals in the bruehe) and it seems to taste better to us if herbs and spices are left out completely. My basic method is to make a puree of pumpkin and other vegetables, so you just put in however much you want and go from there. One nice thing about this time of year in Germany is that you can go to the vegetable market and have them cut you a hunk of pumpkin so you don't have to waste a lot or use up all your freezer space. My friend Donna got a monster from her neighbor last year and was begging to give away pumpkin. (Actually, I just made some soup from that guy from last year and it was delish so thanks DJ!)

Fresh pumpkin, peeled and chunked...several pieces
Potatoes...a few....peeled and halved or quartered depending on size
Carrots...peeled and in chunks
Onion....peeled and quartered
Leeks...just the white part, in chunks
Garlic cloves, a couple if the mood hits you
Celery (stalks) if you have some, a few, cut into chunks

Throw all of this in a pressure cooker with a little water in the bottom. Bring it up to pressure on high heat, then turn it down to medium heat for about 10 minutes. Cool under cold water and open. My method is to mash this all up with a hand held whizzer, but a food processor would also work. Process until you have a smooth puree. Put it back into a pan on the stove, and add bruehe or chicken stock that you have made with bullion cubes or I supposed canned would work too...but good old German bruehe has some good flavor involved, so this is what I use and chemicals be damned.
Add the liquid until you have the consistency that you want....probably at least 4 cups, maybe more. Just eyeball it. Heat through and if you want creamy soup, add some cream at the end.
Eat, slurp and be merry because winter is coming!

Bush countdown clock for those of you, like me, who are counting the days, minutes, and seconds......

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September 11th

I was in Prague of all places on September 11, 2001. I was with 3 friends, and we were starting across the bridge over the Charles River when a young Irish guy with spikes in his face stopped and asked us if we had heard what had happened in New York. The spike in his eyebrow made us not believe a thing he said. My friend called her husband in Munich and we joined with the rest of the world in the horror that was this day. Three out of four of us were in too much shock to even shed a tear, and though we had CNN and could watch it over and over, it just did not seem real. We left Prague via train the next day, and while in the train station a man came over to the 4 of us, and in broken English said that he was very sorry about what had happened to our country. This moment of kindness sent us all over the edge into tears. I did not really fall apart again until my friends flew back to the states....I was ironing and watching the ongoing coverage, and it all came out like a waterfall.
What can one say 5 years later? It is still bone achingly sad watching the observances on CNN, and I still don't and never will understand why my country reacted with a war in Iraq.