Skip to main content

Lentil Soup

Lentil Soup

Another lentil soup (see last month's blog about green lentil and lime soup) but this time it's red. Still in "What can I use up from my cupboard?" mode and entering a new and overlapping mode entitled "Yikes! How can I economise now my pay has been cut?", I came across one and a half packets of red lentils earlier in the week, thanks to the younger offspring's thorough tidying of the stores. I checked The Soup Book and came across the recipe containing red lentils, onions, celery, carrots, garlic and vegetable stock. At half past eight this morning I got up and started my preparations. The spouse had bought the required vegetable juice yesterday. The recipe options were tomato or vegetable juice and stirred by the autonomy of doing the weekly shopping unfettered by his helpmeet, he chose vegetable. What a man!

The stock is vegetable and I'm using a commercial bouillon mix for the first time. Curry powder is called for but my partly Anglo-Indian upbringing doesn't allow me to keep it in the house so I've used garam masala instead.

The soup is simmering away now as I type and I've been listening to Sunday Miscellany on RTE Radio 1. I enjoy this programme with its variety of music and themes and writers' interests. Most pieces are trivial, but I am always impressed by how the writer has taken a fleeting thought and developed it into something worth sharing.

The soup is ready now and tastes sweeter than I expected. We'll be having it for dinner tomorrow evening as we'll be out for lunch today.

Honey-Dipped Points

Easter Monday (5th April) was a busy bee-related day for me! A few weeks ago a friend mentioned the Shanvaus Apiary in Co Leitrim to me so I looked it up. You can find it on the Bee Park Community website (www.beeparkcommunitycentre.com/manorhamilton-origin-farmers-market.html) or on its own link (www.irishbeekeeping4you.info).

I also looked up the Brynderi Honey Farm in Carmarthenshire, Wales, as there is a family connection. The link is www.brynderihoneyfarm.com.

On Monday afternoon I listened to a radio programme on RTE Radio 1 marking the fortieth anniversary of the founding of the Gallery Press by Peter Fallon. I mention this just because of my blogs of 16th January and 2nd April. It's funny how things connect to each other.

Later that same day the BBC television programme QI (Quite Interesting) opened with a clip of the panel members discussing what to do with dying bees - www.youtube.com/watch?v=65S2Bs8M9-w (first shown November 2009). All true bee lovers be warned!
Here's another one about the death of indigenous British bees during World War I (shown in June 2008 - www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3BveeeFXPw).

The bee connection for this honey-dipped point might appear somewhat tenuous. At Your Service (a television on series on RTE 1) featured chef Aidan McGrath and his wife Kate Sweeney who took over a small hotel near Lisdoonvarna, Co Clare (www.rte.ie/player/#v=1070114). They have renamed the hotel Wild Honey Inn (www.wildhoneyinn.com).

Finally, this honey-dipped point is really stretching it. I brought the younger offspring to his first jazz concert at the National Concert Hall last Wednesday. How is it connected? It was entitled Boylan Plays Brubeck - there are two b's in the title! Groan.

Comments

  1. Reading the blog a week to late but worthwhile as usual....funny enough thought of you when I watched "At Your Service" - thought the name was beautiful. MH

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Tuscan Bean Soup

Tuscan Bean Soup This recipe calls for canned beans (borlotti, flageolet or cannellini) and as I have been tidying and cleaning out our cupboards I've used cannellini beans. I have to mention that the younger offspring has done an impressive job on the cupboards. That's enough about him. Back to me and my soup! Other ingredients include onion, carrots, leek, garlic, tomatoes, tomato puree (I substituted sun-dried tomato paste as there was an open jar of it in the fridge), chicken stock (I had to use a cube as my home-made reserves have been used up) and spinach.When ready it's served with ciabatta bread, grated Parmesan and a drizzle of olive oil. So it's quite a rich soup. We've just had the Tuscan bean soup for lunch. All enjoyed it. The adult males were particularly forthcoming in their praise. The spouse liked the "tomato-ey sharpness" and mused that ham stock should be considered as an alternative to chicken stock. Bees' Cheese and other recipes H

Lovage Soup

Lovage Soup   Today I made lovage soup, the second recipe by Sophie Grigson in The Soup Book that I have used in the last four days. She introduces the recipe with these remarks: "If you don't grow this old-fashioned herb yourself, ask around among your gardening friends or head down to the nearest garden centre to see if they sell it. " As I mentioned in my last blog entry (18th May), lovage now features among the herbs in my front garden. As the spouse left the camera at home, I took some photographs. Parsley, sorrel and lovage in Minnie's garden. Rosemary, parsley and lovage in Minnie's garden.  I had hoped to add chervil to my collection of herbs - there's a recipe for vegetable and chervil soup in The Soup Book - but "Young Stephen" wasn't able to source any for me. At least he tried. Just while I'm mentioning Stephen, I have to reveal that the spouse and the older offspring claim that he has been mention

Mulligatawny Manoeuvres

Mulligatawny I see it's only been six months since I last made mulligatawny. The first time was back in May 2011 when I followed Roopa Gulati's recipe in The Soup Book ; last September I used The Essential Asian Cookbook . Today I used Rick Stein's India , a Christmas present from the spouse. It's one of those luxurious recipe books with thick paper and beautiful, vibrantly colourful photos. We had all been impressed by Roopa's recipe, less so by the second book, so how would we fare today? Well, those two recipes both involved apple. Rick's did not, so I felt that this must be a more authentic recipe. If Anglo-Indian cooking has any authenticity these days. Still, Rick states that his recipe is on the menu at the Madras Club in Chennai. It involves making a spice paste first and then the soup. Ingredients: The paste called for coriander seeds, cumin seeds, peppercorns, curry powder, turmeric, garlic, ginger, and fresh coriander, curry and mint leave