food blog: baked potato soup recipe

so we had this big dinner at our house for Christmas. on the menu: top loin roast (that's what they cut the NY steaks from), a sprial cut honey baked ham, a lasagne, garlic and herb roasted red potatoes, and for the more traditionalists, a dozen HUGE baked idaho spuds.
so when the dust settled, and everyone went home with a ton of leftovers, i ended up with a load of beef, and 5 BIGASSED russet spuds.
hmmmm. what to do, what to do. toss the meat into a ziplock, and eat eat eat. i'll post the recipe for that later.
but the spuds: i had plans. one of my favorite soups is Baked Potato Soup. yes, i used capital letters. what the hell do i like on my spuds? butter, bacon, sour cream, chives ... sounds like a plan
as always, click for more size choices
INGREDIENTS

• 5 big baked potatoes. if you don't have them, rinse, poke some fork holes in the skin, lightly (very very lightly) oil the skins, and wrap with aluminum foil. toss in the oven at around 375 or 400 degF for about an hour. they are done when they give when squeezed
• 10 thick slices of bacon, fried and chopped. hmm 5 spuds, 10 pieces of bacon. coincidence? i think not. save the bacon grease for saute duty
• 1 yellow onion, chopped fine to medium. this is about 2 cups of onion
• 3 big cloves garlic, minced. this is about 1 to 1 2/2 tbs or so
• 2 quarts chicken stock
• 2 cups half and half. why skimp?
• big handful of chopped parsley
• 2 tsp dried basil
• 1 tbs kosher salt
• 2 tsp coarse pepper
• 3/4 cup flour
• 2 cups shredded cheese. i used about 1/2 sharp cheddar and 1/2 colby jack because it melts so well

first, peel 3 or 4 of the baked spuds. don't get too finikity peeling. i leave at least one unpeeled, and don't get too crazy with the paring knife with the others. gives the soup an interesting texture, and a rustic appearance. coarsely chop the spuds.
in your soup pot (remember, you will need good sized pot here kids) heat about 4 tbs of the bacon grease (i measured, that's about how much i got from frying) and saute the onions until they start to turn translucent. towards the end, toss in the garlic. give it another minute, then add the flour, all at once. basically you are making an onion, garlic, bacon grease roux. stir until you see the flour has absorbed all the fat, then keep stirring for another minute. add the stock slowly, wisking the whole time to get the roux dissolved in the stock. bring to a boil, and then turn down the heat to simmer for about 15 minutes.
when the base is yummy looking, toss in 1/2 the bacon and everything else except the cheese. bring back to a boil, reduce to a simmer, and let everything cook together for another 10 or 15 minutes. don't forget to stir. lots of stuff here that could burn on the bottom of the pot.
when you just can't stand it anymore, or when everything is heated through and through, turn off the heat and add 1 1/2 cups of cheese. stir until melted.
ladle into a soup bowls, top with a little of the reserved cheese and bacon, and dig in.

as always, if you try this recipe, or it inspires you to try something different, please let me know how it turned out. i'm always looking for fresh and clever ideas to improve my own cooking skills and recipes.

for a complete list of my online recipes, follow the link here