Canned soup used in recipes.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

On FB I often see those adorable little recipe videos, some of which look quite good. But I simply am no longer willing to use commercially canned soups anymore, for various reasons. The high salt content, the nasty chemical taste many of them have.

Any suggestions about substitutes?

[procon]

1. Most condensed cream soups are just variations on the classic Bechamel Sauce.

This basic white sauce is made with butter, flour and milk. You can season it to taste, and add other ingredients, like sauteed mushrooms, carmelized onions, cheese, chopped hardboiled eggs... dozens of possibilities await.

[Retrograde]

5. Yes! Once you get comfortable with a basic white sauce

(you can call it a Bechemel if you want to be all frenchified). Melt your a TBSP of your fat (usually butter, but other fats and oils can be used), add a tbsp of flour and cook for a few minutes, stirring to make a paste. Then, over low heat, slowly whisk in a cup of milk. Cook until slightly thickened, and it's ready to use. I add a handful of grated cheese for a cheese soup (or for mac and cheese). Since casseroles are one of my go-tos for leftovers I make a lot of white sauces.

[GentryDixon]

2. S.O.S Soup & sauce mix

I clipped this many years ago from the Salt Lake Tribune.

It works out well as a replacement.

[pengillian101]

4. Thanks for the recipe!

This sounds like it'll make a good one

[PennyK]

3. Here's my Dad's crazy invention

Heat up a can of Campbell's Vegetarian Vegetable - without adding water, and add a dash of Worcestershire.
Make a plain omelet. Pour the soup over the omelet, and enjoy. There's enough for two or three omelets.
it's weird but delicious.

[dem in texas]

6. I don't use them either, except for one recipe

I have been making Swedish Meatballs using a can of cream of mushroom soup for the sauce for 30 years. It is my son's favorite dish and it is a great dish to take to luncheons and family dinners. I always get requests for the recipe. I use the can of soup, a can of milk, a little sour cream if I have some on hand, a shake of black pepper, a little Worcestershire sauce and a two teaspoons of nutmeg. I must confess, I add a packet of dry onion soup to my meatballs when I make them, they seem to absorb a some of the moisture and help hold the meatballs together plus add flavor.

Any other recipe that calls for canned soup, I find another recipe. yes, make your white sauce, it is so easy and only takes a few minutes, Use a whisk when stirring it.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

7. Thanks to everyone for their responses.

I find that as I give up using things like canned soups, as I move more and more to things made from scratch, I really notice the chemical tastes of things, the gross chemical taste of things like canned soups. Okay, some I'm being a bit redundant, but the theme is still the same.

A few years back I had a part time job (the details are truly unimportant and I don't want to identify anything) where on Fridays I'd bake some sort of treat to share with my fellow employees. I'd bake cookies or brownies or various kinds of cakes. I sincerely love baking, and I also love to share, especially since I live alone. I found it somewhat embarrassing, how much my co-workers loved my treats. It was beyond obvious how few of them had ever had anything baked from scratch.

As an aside. I've become convinced that the vast majority of bakeries used commercial mixes for most of their goods. I think that in part (actually mostly) because when I sample their stuff I can tell it's commercial crap, and because, as noted before, the extreme enthusiasm that real home made goods are greeted.

So many people today have never tasted the real thing. And even bakeries seem to use various pre-packaged, industrialized versions of things like cakes and cookies. So when I show up with the real thing (flour, shortening, sugar, chips, etc) they are completely overwhelmed, because they've never experienced anything quite like that.

Hmmm. Maybe I could take over the world with my baking. . . .

[japple]

8. Amen to everything you said. I try to cook almost everything from scratch and use my mother's

recipes for the most part, because she was a great cook.

I wish you would take over the world with your baking..

LaBrea Bread Co. produces excellent products that are available in my local groceries. They are just about the only baked products that I will buy. They come into the store as frozen loaves. I take them home and keep frozen until I need to use them.

The only bread I bake from scratch is cornbread.

[Cairycat]

9. I think Pepperidge Farm cookies

and many (but not all) of their products don't have that chemical taste and are acceptable.

I feel very fortunate living where I do because we get all our bread from a local bakery run by Bosnian immigrants. It's whole wheat, only real ingredients, very tasty, and $1.50 a loaf