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If recipes like “Mom, the House Smells Great” Roasted Chicken and Lazy-Day Beef & Vegetable Soup sound like they would hit the spot on a cold winter’s day, then be sure to tune into this week’s Cooking with the Moms radio podcast show on Hearty Winter Dinners.

The roasted chicken was featured in our cookbook, The Moms’ Guide to Meal Makeovers, and is surprisingly easy. Your house will definitely smell great when you make this dish, and your kids will definitely ask for seconds. Our simple beef and veggie soup is chock-full of great nutrition and is brimming with rich flavors. The stew meat — which cooks for hours in the slow cooker — melts in your mouth, and as Liz likes to say, “it’s like butt-ah.”  She’s from New York, so she can get away with that!

We hope you enjoy listing to the show as much as we enjoyed recording it.

Sometimes the craziest recipes make the biggest impression on kids. A few weeks back, Simon joined me on my weekly trip to the supermarket. I’m sure he would have preferred staying home with his soccer ball, but he tagged along anyway without complaint (probably because he knew he could play his favorite sneak-as-many-boxes-of-cookies-into-Mom’s-shopping-cart-without-being-noticed game).

On this particular trip, Simon had his sights set on soup (and cookies, of course). It seemed bizarre but he insisted on a Creamy Portobello Mushroom Soup - one of the all-natural soups from Imagine. I kid you not.

So that night, I took the soup, added a few nutritious ingredients to jazz it up, and presented “mud” with dinner to the delight of everyone.

Muddy Mushroom Soup

Makes About 5 Servings

• 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
• One pound mushrooms, coarsely chopped
• Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
• One 32-ounce carton Creamy Portobello Mushroom Soup
• 1 cup oyster crackers

1. Heat the oil in a large Dutch oven or saucepan over medium-high heat. Add the mushrooms and cook, stirring frequently, until tender, 5 to 7 minutes. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
2. Add the soup and bring to a low boil, stirring occasionally. Serve in individual bowls and top with oyster crackers (look for trans-fat free oyster crackers from companies like Westminster Cracker Company or Trader Joe’s).

Nutrition Information per Serving: 160 calories, 7g fat (0g saturated), 360mg sodium, 19g carbohydrate, 3g fiber, 6g protein, 10% iron

While Simon ate it happily, Josh was a bit skeptical. That’s when I came up with the name, Muddy Mushroom Soup. In the end, Josh also gave it two thumbs up and said he really loved it. The only complaint from the boys and hubby Tim was that the soup needed more mushrooms — can you imagine kids actually asking for MORE vegetables!? (I originally made it with 10 ounces of mushrooms, but have since increased it to a pound — use the 10 ounces if you think your troops would prefer a bit less).

For more soup ideas, tune into this week’s Soups that Satisfy podcast. But before you leave our blog, feel free to share any of your own silly recipe success stories.

~ Liz