Skip to main content

Mussel and Saffron Soup

Mussel and Saffron Soup 

Gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous! Yes, yesterday's soup was a triumph! The recipe by Rosemary Shrager, from the fish section of The Soup Book, was easy to follow and didn't require extraordinary ingredients: dry white wine, mussels, saffron, onion, garlic, leek, carrots, celeriac, butter, cream and curry powder. The spouse kindly sorted out the mussels for me, claiming they were surprisingly noisy. Chills ran down my murderous spine at the thought of the helpless little beasts.

Mussel and saffron soup
My own preparation involved slicing and chopping the vegetables and deciding whether to use double or light cream in view of this household's concern about cholesterol levels. There's no point in holding back when making a luxury soup, so double cream it was. The first part of the cooking involved - the faint-hearted should look away now - killing the mussels in white wine and stock. They were set aside while I gently cooked the vegetables. Then the stock (now enhanced with flavours from the mussels) was poured back into the pan, then the cream and curry powder were stirred in, and finally the mussels were returned to the pan.

The spouse and I sat down to eat. Definitely one of our favourites, definitely one to be made another day. I reheated some earlier today for my lunch: still good.

Bee is for Benson

I am delighted to be able to mention a bee reference that I came across in one of my favourite books of all time. Nearly thirty years ago I discovered the Mapp and Lucia novels by E F Benson, which were originally published in the 1920s and 1930s. I have re-read them several times and they have never failed to amuse me. Once upon a time I had the complete set of six published by Black Swan in the 1980s but Miss Mapp was lost. I obtained my current copy (not a Black Swan) eleven years ago.

In the extract below the eponymous Elizabeth Mapp has stopped on Tilling High Street to talk to the clergyman Mr Kenneth Bartlett.

'Yes; Tuesday morning,' said Miss Mapp. 'I pay all my household books on Tuesday. ...Little duties in all directions! And you; you're always busy! Such a busy bee!'
'Busy B? Busy Bartlett, quo' she! Yes, I'm a busy B today, Mistress Mapp. ...No time for a walk today, let alone a bit turn at the gowf [golf].'
Miss Mapp saw her opening, and made a busy bee-line for it. 

Bee Brief

I bought a card yesterday simply because it had an illustration of a bee skep (or skip - the title used on the card). I couldn't find it on the internet, but while searching came across this link to Chris Slade's bee blog.

That's it for this weekend.

Minnie

Labels:

Comments

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
Post a Comment
Read more

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
1 comment
Read more

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
Post a Comment
Read more