Food Challege: Roasted Potato Pumpkin Soup

My dear friend, Savanna, posted on my Facebook wall a challenge. Her sister had made a potato bacon pumpkin soup, but couldn't give her an exact recipe, only a jumble of ingredients that were used. She challenged me to make a soup which I could give her a recipe for. I never had the original soup, so I have no clue what that soup tasted like. I did, however, manage to make a pretty tasty version. I think this is a good winter soup, nice and rich. Let's get going!

Ingredients:
5 small red potatoes
1 (29 oz) can  pumpkin puree
1 (8 oz) can  tomato sauce
2 (14.5 oz) cans chicken broth (mine was reduced sodium)
1 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup sour cream
1/2 lb bacon
2 tsp salt
2 tsp garlic salt
2 tsp onion powder
1 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp pepper
1 tsp chile powder
Additional bacon for sprinkling
Olive oil
1/4 cup sour cream mixed with a few TBS of milk

First things first, get your potatoes ready. Take this:

My 5 small potatoes.

and turn it into this:

Potatoes ready for the oven.

Pretty much cut the potatoes into small pieces and place them on a baking sheet sprayed with cooking spray. Drizzle the potatoes with olive oil and place in a 425 degree oven for about 30 min, stirring at least once, until they look about like this:

Fully roasted potatoes.

While the potatoes are cooking, it is a good time to cook your bacon. I just cooked the whole package and crumbled it all up. Only half will go directly in the soup.

The next part is pretty simple, take all of the ingredients, other than the olive oil, extra bacon, and sour cream/milk mixture, and mix them really well in a big pot. Let all the ingredients simmer together on medium heat until it is all nice and steamy.

Finished soup, after some had been taken out.

When you serve yourself a bowl, you get to be a little creative. Sprinkle with bacon and swirl with the sour cream/milk mixture as desired. Here are a few examples:

Pretty aren't they? I feel like an Iron Chef (okay...maybe not quite that awesome). I know this is a really rich soup, and you can cut that a little if you use milk instead of cream. That would also cut calories..but this version is pretty tasty, and I never called this healthy food for healthful people.

Savanna, I hope this is somewhat what like you had been hoping.

I know I have been MIA as far as this blog goes. I'm currently living with my parents, and my cooking mojo is a little off. This challenge was great for me to get back into things. Anyone else have a food challenge they would like me to try? Comment, Facebook, or E-mail me at munchkinmaw@gmail.com. I will gladly except.

As far as the guess the recipe from SEPTEMBER, it was BBQ sauce, Melinda wins! The recipe is currently hidden somewhere in my storage unit, but once I recover it, it will be posted. The winner shall receive a pre-made version for home use.