Everybody knows the million benefits of broccoli: it helps with almost every single organ of our body, it helps to lower our bad cholesterol; it has an amazing combination of phytonutrients that help detoxify our body, and it gets rid of unwanted contaminants. Broccoli also gives us an amazing amount of vitamin A and K, among other vitamins and minerals and it has a significant amount of omega 3 fatty acids that are a powerful anti-inflamatory weapon in our body. It helps our bones, our heart, and it’s a super alkalizing food that helps our body be less acidic.

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Broccoli is an amazing vegetable and I could extol its virtues for quite some time but the most important detail here is this: broccoli is delicious and versatile. It tastes good steamed, roasted, raw, or pureed. It’s also great in soups, like the one below.

I got the inspiration for this soup a day that I had nothing left in the fridge and remembered a soup we had at a wedding party with broccoli and oysters. I thought that if that soup was amazing with oysters, it couldn’t be wrong with shitakes. And boy was I right, it turned out amazing! Little by little I tweaked the recipe a bit until I perfected my dish. It’s easy to prepare, yet refined in flavor and fancy enough for a dinner party or why not, a wedding.

When I prepare this soup I like to prepare a double or triple batch of shitake chips; they taste great with everything and give an extra boost of flavor to salads, wraps, and other soups. And though they lose their crunchiness if kept long, it’s never been a problem for me. No matter how batches I prepare, they always disappear.

Get the recipe.