Idaho Style Cream of Potato Soup: If the Shoe Fits Wear It

My vision of cream of potato soup was informed by the classic version – Vichyssoise. It didn’t appeal to me. Think of it, warm or cold, watery mashed potatoes with leeks just doesn’t conjure up a vision of culinary delight. My pantry would have to be pretty bare before I’d make something like that.

The restaurant in the Boise airport changed my mind on the subject. Understand, the default motto on Idaho’s license plates is “Great Potatoes.” My first impression of the city set a number of years ago, after disembarking from the plane the first marvel that greeted me was a vending machine that cooked up hot French fries. How could you not plug a couple of quarters into a machine like that? 
Once again, upon leaving Boise while in the airport, another potato dish bid me farewell. Cream of potato soup was menu item at airport’s restaurant. Setting aside any Vichyssoise prejudice, I ordered a bowl of it. If anywhere there was a perfect bowl of cream of potato soup I reasoned it would be in Idaho, in the Boise airport. It was very good, a kind of Rocky Mountain ham chowder.
 
God's Potato Garden

Idaho’s identification with a lowly russet potato is an instance where general rule of “if the shoe fit’s wear it” has been followed. God, it seems, intended southern Idaho to become his potato patch. The climate and rich volcanic soil in southern Idaho are perfect for growing potatoes. While the climate is semiarid, Rocky mountain snowpack acts as a huge fresh water reservoir. Water from that reservoir is distributed across southern Idaho via the Snake River and its tributaries.

In the early 1920s, irrigation and agricultural mechanization gave birth to industrial agriculture in southern Idaho. Idaho is now the overwhelming to potato producing state in the U.S. In 2009 roughly 350 thousand acres were planted. Potatoes are a $2.5 billion industry.

 J.R. Simplot caught the crest of that gathering wave. He founded the J.R. Simplot Company in 1929 to process potatoes and other vegetables.

According to Wikipedia, he made one fortune during WWII supplying the armed forces with dehydrated potatoes and onions, and another after that following the invention of the frozen French fry by one of his food scientists. By the early 1970s, Simplot was a primary supplier of frozen French fries to McDonald’s.

The J.R. Simplot Company is headquartered in Boise, as was Ore-Ida until 1999. Ore-Ida invented the tater tot. It also invented the French fry vending machine. It had 50 hand built prototype machines made in 1991, for test marketing [Full Text]. More than likely I encountered one of these original magnificent machines in the Boise airport.

Potatoes, a “new world” food, are cropped all over the world. I once had the good pleasure of having a couple of Indian students prepare a traditional Indian meal at my home. The menu included curried potatoes. The Germans plant more acres of potatoes than Idaho does. It is the home of German potato salad, potato dumplings and potato pancakes. Despite this, Germany does not claim to be the potato nation.

Against this backdrop, Idaho proudly makes claim to the state of “great potatoes.” Well if the shoe fits, even in ordinary things like potatoes, wear it. Increasingly, in ordinary things we are forced into shoes that don’t fit and are painfully troublesome. Increasingly, even in ordinary things, we are painfully shoehorned by politically correct think.

Groupthink Ill-fitting Shoes

In a recent essay, Victor Davis Hanson wrote about the troublesome fit imposed upon us by groupthink in regard to the Boston Marathon bombing. In the name of politically correct thought which he linked to the Star Trek era Cyber Borgs, we’ve have decided to ignore radical Islamist thought is the primary source of global terror. [Full Text]

“The result has been that ever since 2009, various members of the administration collective have sought, each according to his station, to bring us into the network of not associating Islamism with terror. And the Borg have certainly been diverse, as all sorts of political appointees, opportunists, and career officers plugged themselves into the hive. Obama may have killed ten times as many suspected Muslim terrorists by drone as did Bush, but we were to assume that the fact that there were no Christian, Jewish, or Buddhist victims of Hellfire missiles was irrelevant.

”Shortly after assuming office as the head of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano associated the prior “war on terror” with a “politics of fear”: “In my speech, although I did not use the word ‘terrorism,’ I referred to ‘man-caused’ disasters. That is perhaps only a nuance, but it demonstrates that we want to move away from the politics of fear toward a policy of being prepared for all risks that can occur.” Again, one wishes to ask her how many Christians have been targeted by Obama-administration Predator drones.”

He went on to observe:  

“After the Fort Hood shootings, the Defense Department characterized the murders as “workplace violence,” despite the known fact that Major Hasan had been interviewed by the FBI because of his correspondence with the radical imam Anwar al-Awlaki, and even though he yelled “Allahu Akbar!” as he killed twelve soldiers and one civilian and wounded more than 30 others. The military was absorbed into the non-Islamic groupthink to such a degree that Army Chief of Staff George Casey editorialized of the mass murder of his soldiers: “Our diversity, not only in our Army, but in our country, is a strength. And as horrific as this tragedy was, if our diversity becomes a casualty, I think that’s worse.” Dismantling the “diversity program” would be worse than the slaughter at Fort Hood? These days our martyrs are to die not on the altar of freedom, but on the altar of diversity?”$

He then concluded:

What will break up the Borg? Tragically, it may take another Boston-style bombing to send enough rogue voltage through the system to explode the circuitry and free the drones from the hive.

It should be remembered, following the bombing, all of Boston was “locked down” in informal martial law while government authorities conducted a massive search for the remaining suspect fugitive. The shoe didn’t fit. Communities are relatively self-policing. The bomber wasn’t found until after the lockdown was a lifted and a local homeowner saw something amiss with his boat in his back yard.

Throughout, we need enough rogue voltage to explode the circuitry that binds us in so many ill fitting shoes. The guy eyeing his boat was a spark of rogue voltage. We need the courage to say something’s amiss.

Affordable Health Care that is Anything But

The newly minted Affordable Health Care Act, is another type of ill-fitting shoe we’re forced to buy and wear. It is the exact opposite of what its title implies. It’s an ill-fitting shoe that will increase the cost of health services for most of us, and in to many cases dramatically so. Never the less, the president boldly announced at a recent press conference, "A huge chunk of it's already been implemented…and it’s working fine."

Investor’s Business Daily took exception to that [Full Text]:

“Democrats put off the bulk of the law — the massive market regulations, the government-run exchanges, mandates to buy coverage, and various taxes and fees—until 2014, both to hide its true costs and to avoid any unpleasantness before the 2012 elections.
 

"For the 85% to 90% of Americans who already have health insurance ... they don't have to worry about anything else."

Really? The Congressional Budget Office expects 7 million workers — and possibly as many as 20 million — will lose their employer coverage because of ObamaCare. That's plenty to worry about.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said millions of seniors will get dumped from their private Medicare Advantage plans by 2017 thanks to sharp payment cuts required by the law.

And small businesses now providing coverage face huge rate hikes thanks to ObamaCare's many market regulations and benefit mandates. Maryland's biggest insurer, nonprofit CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield, said ObamaCare will force rates up by 15% next year.

"The other stuff's been implemented and it's working fine."

That's only true if you ignore the fact that ObamaCare's high-risk pools have been a disaster, attracting a third as many people as predicted while costing far more than the administration budgeted.

Or the fact that Obama had to issue more than 1,200 waivers to companies who said the law's initial insurance market rules would have forced them to cancel coverage for millions of workers.

The overly complicated small-business tax credit has also been a bust, with only about 5% of eligible firms taking advantage of it. And so on.

"We're going to be able to drive down costs ... and that will save the country money as a whole over the long term."

Except, Obama's own health care number crunchers say ObamaCare will force national health spending up 7.4% in 2014, and add billions in costs over the next decade. The Congressional Budget Office says it will add massively to federal health spending.

And the architects of Obama's reform wrote in the New England Journal of Medicine about how, despite ObamaCare, "health costs remain a major challenge."

It all leads one to wonder: Is Obama just dangerously misinformed about ObamaCare? Or is he willfully misleading the country?”

Misinformed and misleading are two sides of the same coin. The operating word in the Investor’s Business Daily’s editorial is “willfully.” The president, government bureaucracies on all levels, academia and the press have “willfully” adopted a point of view that a vast centralized government can solve all of our problems. One size fits all. It drives Hanson’s Borg like group think. 

It's as if the only cream of potato soup we should be allowed to make or order is a cold, watery mashed potato soup with leeks.

With that, here is a proper cream of potato soup as if made in the Boise Airport restaurant. This will amply serve four, or six if served as a first course of a larger meal.

2 Ham shanks 1 pound each

3 or 4 Medium russet potatoes baked, peeled and cut into    bite sized pieces.

2 Ribs of celery cut to a small dice

1 Medium onion cut to a small dice
1 Large carrot cut to a small dice

4 Table spoons butter

4 Table spoons flour

½ Pint heavy cream

2 Pints of water

Ham soup base

Pepper, Onion powder and ground celery seed to taste. 

In a gallon soup pot cover the ham shanks with two pints of water, bring to a slow boil and cook for about two hours until the ham begins falling from the bone. Add additional water as needed. Remove the ham shanks and cut the ham from the bone and into bite sized pieces.

Melt the butter in a sauté pan and whisk in flour to make a roux. Adjust the ham stock for flavor with ham soup base if needed. Bring the stock to a boil gradually add roux to thicken. Add celery and onion cook until al dente. Add the diced ham, potatoes and cream. Season to taste with pepper, onion powder and ground celery seed. Serve when ham and potatoes are warmed.