I am sitting here with a bloated stomach and feeling very pleased with myself. I just loaded myself up with a variation of my Bacon Soup recipe.

I have to say variation because I make it differently damn near every time that I make it. I took the time (between shoveling spoonfuls of soup into my yap) to think about where I found this recipe, and how I started making it. I am torn between it's origination in either Olive Garden's Zuppa Toscana or Bennigan’s Ultimate Baked Potato Soup (those recipes I will link to in a bit).

Knockoff of Olive Garden's Zuppa Toscana

One IT company I used to work for was transferring it's contract; therefore, we actually worked one-quarter days or simply showed up at work and screwed around. One of the consequences of this situation was long liquidly enhanced lunches at places like Olive Garden or Bennigan’s, or for you Austin folks ,Baby Acapulco. If you are ever in your early 30s and have a chance to get paid for sitting around drinking for half a day, it's worth it, LOL. One of the benefits of soup as an emerging alchy is that you have more room for booze.

Bennigan’s Ultimate Baked Potato Soup, but hold the sandwich

Anyway, on to the "recipe". The base of this ever-changing recipe is cream of potato soup (generic works just as good as Cambell's). My first version was Pork Chop Soup, as I would fry up pork chops on a Foreman's grill, and put them in the soup. I swapped out pork chops for bacon on a whim once, and bacon has been my favorite variety since.

With that base, you have a wide range of ingredients to play with, and they are all good.

• Meat - Pork Chops, Bacon, Ground Beef. Pouring the grease from the meat into the soup is your option. People have accused me of trying to murder them by artery clogging by the way I cook. Up to you.
• Cheese, butter, and cream - Excessive butter and cheese are necessities. Cream is good, and you need some fat on your behind if you want to sit comfortably. Which cheese to use is your own option, but I like Colby Jack the most. If you are not absolutely sure that you have added enough cheese, then you haven't.
• Veggies - Potatoes, Mushrooms, and Onions are optimum. You could use spinach if you want, but I never do. You can cook these as part of the soup (takes longer), or prep them while the meat cooks. I usually saute the mushies and onions before adding them to the soup. Best to boil the taters first, though.
• Spice - The Staff of Life: Lemon Pepper works nicely with pork chops and surprsingly with bacon. Garlic Pepper works with everything. McCormick Monterey Style Seasoning sets off ground beef nicely.
• More cheese - You think I'm joking, don't you?

How I did it today

• Cubed the taters, set them boiling.
• Started browning the ground beef
• Chopped up some bacon, mushrooms, and onions, and set aside some butter in teaspoon doses
• Put a little garlic pepper in the beef
• Drained the beef, put in a bowl and put it in the microwave to retain heat
• Put two doses of butter in the pan with the bacon and onions and let the bacon crisp and the onions brown
• Threw in the mushrooms
• Drained the potatoes and put them in with the ground beef to wait
• Put the rest of the butter in a pot with the cream of potato, some water, and some left over whipping cream
• Let the mushrooms finish
• Poured everything in with the cream of potato.
• Added some more garlic pepper.

Sorry I don't have measurements to work with. I just eyeball it.

Here are the recipes for the restaurant soups...I could probably sit at Olive Garden all day on the Soup, Salads, and Breadsticks slurping down Zuppa Toscana:
Olive Garden Copycat Zuppa Toscana
Bennigan’s Ultimate Baked Potato Soup

Let me know if you have any suggestions for anything else that would work, please!