Jalapeno Potato Soup

My wife and I were introduced to this soup on a Royal Caribbean Mediterranean cruise. On returning to Canada we just had to find a recipe, and a quick search resulted in the recipe below.  While I have added some notes I take no credit for developing this excellent recipe.

Although it is entirely subjective, I do not consider this dish spicy, the evaporated milk and potatoes neutralize most of it. It has just enough heat to warm your belly after a full bowl. Many people that have tried it get no heat, while the very occasional person  has gone off in search of a glass of water.

Jalapeno Potato Soup
Yield: 18 entree servings
Source: Peach Tree Gift Gallery and Tearoom

Ingredients
1 medium onion; chopped
1/4 cup butter
5 lbs russet potatoes; peeled and cubed
8 cup chicken broth
1 tsp cumin; ground
1/2 cup jalapeno; coarsely chopped
1/16 tsp baking soda
4 cup evaporated milk
salt (optional)
pepper (optional)
sour cream (optional)
green onions (optional)

Instructions
In a large stockpot, saute onion in butter until just tender.
Add potatoes, chicken broth, and cumin, then cover and cook until potatoes are tender (about 20 to 30 minutes).
Remove from heat and add jalapenos (with liquid), baking soda, and evaporated milk.
Coarsely mash potatoes in the pot with a potato masher.
Stir well, season with salt and pepper to taste, return to heat and simmer for 15 minutes, stirring frequently.
Garnish individual servings with a dollop of sour cream and a sprinkling of chopped green onions if desired.

Notes
The baking soda prevents the evaporated milk from curdling and MUST be added after the jalapeno and before the evaporated milk.
The soup keeps for a few days if refrigerated immediately after cooling although it tends to be thicker when you reheat it. I have not tried freezing and reheating it, if you do please let me know how it works out.
Other peppers can be used, I have already tried this recipe with cubanelle peppers. I do think naga jolokia would be a bit too powerful.
Another idea is to use chipotle peppers (smoked jalapenos) to bring a different flavour.

Nutritional Information (Estimated per serving)
Calories 205 • Fat 7g (Saturated Fat 4g) • Cholesterol 23mg • Sodium 432mg • Carbohydrates 30g (Dietary Fibre 2g • Sugars 7g) • Protein 7g

The Strategic Employee

I was answering a question on LinkedIn when it struck me to search Google for “Strategic Employee”… There were results about strategic employee surveys, strategic employee recognition, strategic employee communication, etc. Everything I found was a strategic way of dealing with employees. What I did not find was a single hit on the concept of a strategic employee. The idea is my evolution of the “Strategic Corporal”  from an article written in 1999 by General Charles C. Krulak, (USMC).

In reality, the goal of any organizational development and/or employee engagement program is to develop and leverage the strategic employee.

The strategic employee understands, and is aligned with the company ethos – their actions and decisions reflect the organization’s vision and values. They make decisions that are “in-line” with the company’s expectations and goals. This is the keystone that enables them to do all the other things listed below.

The strategic employee is engaged in achieving outcomes – they are told the desired results, and constraints and are given responsibility to decide the best way to get there. This creates task ownership, demonstrates trust, and makes the employee feel like a valued team member rather than an interchangeable part.

The strategic employee innovates, and improves processes – who is in a better position to refine and improve processes than the people who are doing the work? Recognize and leverage their expertise in their respective functions by having them collaborate on developing, documenting, and updating “best practices” and solutions. Top-down business processes and policies should be reserved for ensuring compliance with legislative and professional standards – management can address any perceived deficiencies by having the employees develop a solution. Using a wiki-style approach to documenting best practices makes it easy to find information, add comments, suggestions and links to relevant policies.

The strategic employee makes management more productive – since strategic employees are empowered and engaged in achieving goals,and improving processes that achieve the executive’s intent, management spends less time directing and controlling, and consequently have more time to spend on forecasting, planning, coordinating and monitoring.

The strategic employee is a manager in waiting – they are already adding value to the company and demonstrating their ability to take on responsibility and produce results – they already know and support the direction the company is going. Where can you find a better qualified applicant than one who has already proven themselves in your own office.

If you begin developing strategic employees during on-boarding, and continue with a program of periodic professional development sessions there is no reason that you cannot create strategic employees within their first 2 years of employment.

Also see: The Leader-Leader Movement – A leadership development/consulting firm that is already advocating a similar concept.

Introduction

Welcome Reader,

I have finally decided to take the time to put together a blog as a way of sharing some of my rambling thoughts as I feel the desire to commit them to ‘paper’. You can expect to see blogs about a random array of other ideas that pop into my head, as well as some great recipes that you may want to try.

I do not intend to spew every inane thought I conceive into this blog, neither you nor I have the time or inclination to go through this.

As far as a personal introduction, my name is Rob, I am a Canadian, and I like cooking, computers, animals, and an assortment of geeky things – I am currently working on learning more project management skills, improving my vector drawing ability, learning new computer skills, doing genealogy research, looking for a new career, and whenever I have time, racking up a few more hours on the Elder Scrolls: Skyrim. Perhaps not in that order.

I suppose that is enough of an introduction – check back for random ideas and some great recipes.

And to get the first random thought out the door – can a microchip be made that uses light instead of electric current?

Rob

Fus Ro Dah!