"Cream" of Broccoli Soup

 While living in Florida I always looked forward to spending Monday's with Aunt Rose and her family. She would put on a pot of soup and feed the masses! She said that it was always good for you to have soup to cleanse the body of all the crap you ate over the weekend. She didn't exactly say it that way, that's just my interpretation! So here we are, 30 plus years or so later and I am still making soup on Monday nights. Anyone who knows me, knows that there will be some sort of soup served on Monday night.  Soup is the main course so it's usually a hearty soup.
So while today is Tuesday and not Monday I am still making a soup. I am going away tomorrow for a week and know that anything I have in the refrigerator will rot! I had a huge bag of broccoli that had to be cooked, and decided to make it into a velvety "cream" of broccoli soup.
I cleaned about 6 heads of broccoli

put them in a large stock pot with some water and a few cloves of garlic, covered the broccoli and cooked until tender

I put the broccoli into a blender , with a slotted spoon leaving the liquids that the broccoli cooked in remaining in the stock pot,and blended it all until it was a nice smooth mixture

 added it all back into the pot with a cup of chicken stock. The soup was like velvet, so smooth! You can stop right here, or you can add some cheese....like I did!

 I had some Gouda and some cheddar

Stir in the cheese and lower the heat. Once the cheese was melted, I turned off the heat. Ladle the soup into a bowl and enjoy! It is so creamy and delicious!

Buon Appetito!
xoxoxo
Lorraine