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Swedes for My Sweets

Creamy Swede Soup


Swede soup in the making
Having been busy outside and away from my kitchen I just wanted to make a fairly simple soup this weekend. Another factor influencing my choice of recipe was the need to make more progress through the winter vegetables section of The Soup Book. I chopped my onions, trimmed and cubed my swede, made up my vegetable stock from bouillon mixture and lined up my honey, nutmeg and cream. Then I started to cook, frying the onions in butter before tipping in the swede. Ten minutes later I poured in the stock and eased in the honey. While this mixture was coming to a boil I sprinkled in a teaspoon of nutmeg powder (not the grated half of a nutmeg called for in the recipe). This was then left simmering until the swede was soft, at which point I left it to cool while I went off for a shower and some retail therapy. Revived by a new dress, I whizzed the soup in the liquidiser ready for reheating later that evening.

Swede soup and messy cream
The spouse, younger offspring and I assembled for dinner at about 6.30pm. I ladled the soup into warm bowls and tried to swirl cream neatly over the top in. Not with any great success, as the photo shows. In her introduction to the recipe for this soup Celia Brooks Brown writes that the starch stored by swedes in their edible root base gives the soup its velvety texture; I thought it was the liquidising. As well as being velvety, the soup was very tasty: sweet due to the swedes themselves and the honey, no doubt, and so was well complemented by goat's cheese on bread. We all liked it so it's on the "make again" list. Note to self: make the bouillon more dilute next time.






Buzzing About
Honeypot at the Baumwollspinnerei

The spouse and I were in Leipzig last week. One of our sightseeing trips involved a visit to a cafe where I had hot milk with honey for the sake of this blog. Surprisingly delicious! Here's a photo of the honey pot.

While in Leipzig I tried out three German - or Saxon/Sachsen - soups. The first was the best - delicious and thick potato soup with sausage. A second potato soup and a carrot soup were passable but not worthy of my "eat again" list.

Bees are difficult to photograph but I tried to take one of a bee in the Leipzig Friedenspark (see below).

Now I have other things to do so I'll say goodbye for now.

Minnie
Bee at the sensory garden in the Friedenspark, Leipzig
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