I started with a few sliced of thick-cut bacon, cutting them into small pieces and browning them until crisp in the bottom of my biggest pot - a big stainless professional one that I used in my business, don't know the size but would guess a couple of gallons, anyway. Then I removed the bacon, and browned an onion, coarsely chopped, and 1# of ground beef in the same pot. When that was done I added a can of beef broth and some garlic powder, and let it simmer a few minutes while I sliced up a pound or so of "Velveeta-wannabe" cheese and drained 2 cans of diced tomatoes and a can of shitake mushrooms, all of which I then added to the pot, with a couple tablespoons of yellow mustard. Covered and let simmer until the cheese was melting down; cut up half a head of iceberg lettuce - good and crunchy - into bite-sized chunks. Once I stirred in the cheese and the soup was thick and creamy I added a pint of heavy cream and all of the lettuce. Stirred it until it was just heated through - you don't want to wilt the lettuce, just heat it - and tasted for seasoning. (I didn't add salt earlier because that cheese is pretty salty) Then I served it, with the crumbled bacon on top as a garnish. I would have sprinkled a little shredded cheddar on top also, if I'd had any within reach...
It was rich, filling, and tasted JUST LIKE a bacon cheeseburger! And the crunch of the lettuce and bacon were PERFECT! I was really full for the rest of the day, couldn't eat another bite, even though I didn't serve anything else with the soup.
It was easy, even though it had more ingredients and took longer hands-on than my usual dishes. As for cheap...I had paid $1.49 for the ground beef, $1.99 for the 3# bag of onions (and this was MAYBE 6 oz.), $3.99 for the brick of cheese (I usually keep it in the house just to flavor sauces, and use only in small amounts) and used about 2/3 of the brick; lettuce was 99¢ for the whole head, of which I used half, heavy cream was $2.89 for a quart, of which I used half. Diced tomatoes were 59¢ a can, as was the beef broth; mushrooms were 72¢. The cost for the mustard, sea salt, and garlic powder were negligable. It made half of the pot, or, in terms that I can better express, 5 bowls yesterday with about the same left over. 10 servings for less than $12, figuring high. And worth 10 times that!
DELICIOUS!
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