creamy cauliflower chorizo soup

It's getting into soup season- as you could probobly tell. I've been posting a few soups, but I'm sure there will be many to come. I love soup. It's so comforting. This one is creamy and dreamy and perfect.

To appease the fiance, I decided to garnish this pretty heavily with meat. In this case, I went with chorizo. It just so happened that I had some leftover in the fridge just waiting to accompany this soup and it basically went perfectly.

Chorizo doesn't really brown- it just gets darker. But you'll know when it's done. It gets progressively more crumbly as it cooks.

Browned butter is amazing. Have you tried it? It's spectacular and it adds a real depth of flavor. And the little bits of chorizo on the bottom of the pan helps it along.

That's looking pretty good.

Now for the onions. It's not really all that important that the chunks of onion are small, because we will be blending this up later. Let them hang out for a while.

The thickener for this soup is flour. Sprinkle and mix.

Now it's time for the liquids. Chicken stock and milk... you can use cream or half and half if you'd like but I was trying to keep it light.

Annnnnnd now the cauliflower. Again, like the onions, the chopping isn't that important. Bring this all to a boil, cover, and lower the heat. Keep it cooking for about 10 minutes and by then, the cauliflower should be nice and soft.

Pulverize! If you don't have an immersion blender... you can always use a regular blender but please! Be very careful. This will be super duper hot.

Creamy and dreamy... but still missing a few things.

Cheese makes everything better. So does mustard, but you can't see it here.

Finally, we season. All seasons salt, black pepper, smoked paprika and regular salt. Amazing. Garnish with the chorizo and extra cheese. Yum.

Creamy Cauliflower Chorizo Soup
8 oz. loose chorizo sausage
1 head cauliflower, chopped
1 medium onion, chopped
4 cups chicken stock
2 cups milk
3 Tablespoons butter
1/4 cup flour
1 cup Monterey Jack cheese
1 cup sharp cheddar cheese
1 Tablespoon Dijon mustard
1 teaspoon black pepper
1 teaspoon smoked paprika'
1 teaspoon all seasons salt
Salt, to taste

In a large stock pot over medium high heat, cook chorizo sausage until cooked through. Remove from pan with a slotted spoon and set aside. Add butter to pan and reduce heat to medium. Cook butter until sufficiently browned, about 3 minutes. Add in chopped onion and cook until translucent, about 3 minutes. Stir in flour and cook an additional 3 minutes. Add in chicken stock, milk and cauliflower. Bring to a boil and then cover and reduce heat to low. Cook for 10 minutes or until cauliflower is soft. Using an immersion blender (or transferring in batches to a regular blender) puree soup until smooth. Add in mustard and cheese and stir until smooth. Season with salt, pepper, smoked paprika and all seasons salt. Serve with chorizo and additional cheese and enjoy!