Minnie's Soup Kitchen

Broccoli and Gruyere tart: oven ready Yesterday (23rd January) I made broccoli and Gruyere tart using the recipe from Norfolk's Own Cookbook: Everything Stops for Tea . The listed ingredients for the filling include eggs, cooked broccoli, grated Norfolk Dapple or Gruyere cheese, chives, double cream and mustard powder. The spouse is on a weight loss maintenance programme in advance of a family wedding later this year. I'm sure he'll appreciate that I substituted yoghurt for double cream. I couldn't get hold of fresh chives so used parsley instead. I made the pastry in the food processor. I don't mind making it by hand. I was thinking of the woman who taught me how to make pastry. She was a friend of my parents. My sisters and I were staying with her one summer. She lived in Cardiff near a park that I now know is called Pontcanna Fields. She brought us to Porthcawl, Barry Island and up into the Brecon Beacons. I've always used her method for making past...

Mexican chilli bean soup: prep work done Mexican Chilli Bean Soup It's cold out there so a warming spicy soup is the very thing. I've made Mexican chilli bean soup from The Soup Book three times already so knew it would be good. Ingredients Sunflower oil 1 onion, chopped 1 red pepper, deseeded and finely chopped 2 garlic cloves, finely chopped 400g lean minced beef 1 teasp ground cumin 2 teasp chilli powder 1/2 teasp dried oregano 400g can chopped tomatoes 2 TBS tomato puree 750ml hot vegetable or chicken stock 400g can kidney beans, drained and well rinsed handful of chopped parsley salt and pepper  Taking care not to breach copyright, I'm not including the method but you can probably work it out yourselves.  Serve with soured cream, nature yoghurt, creme fraiche, grated cheese, tortillas, tortilla chips ...  I had a bit of almost everything when we ate this for our dinner yesterday (16th January 2016).   Make up your own minds....

My favourite type of yoghurt is natural and unflavoured. I grew up on it as an accompaniment to curry and rice. Sometimes my parents would make a simple raita by adding chopped or slice cucumber or tomato.  When the family first moved to Ireland it was difficult to get plain yoghurt but there was always plenty of strawberry yoghurt. Strange.  I stopped buying and eating commercial fruit yoghurts when I realised how much sugar was in them.  I tried an unfamiliar Irish brand, not noticing until I opened up the tub that it was almost fluid. It tasted as I might have expected but I would have preferred it a little more set. All was not lost. Browsing through my Collins Beekeeper's Bible for first time in months, I came across a recipe for honey and red berry smoothie. The spouse keeps a supply of frozen fruit in the freezer. I put in my breakfast order.  The introduction to the recipe suggests that smoothies are a clever way of getting fruit into children. That's...

Devilled Pork Chops I'm still trying to clear out foodstuffs from the cupboards and to use up any items in our freezer. Yesterday (9th January) I thawed out pork chops for our dinner but wasn't sure what to do with them. I flicked through Doreen Fulleylove's Country Fare and came across her recipe for devilled pork chops.  I wondered what the term devilled means as used in cooking. All I could find was "cooked with hot seasoning", a rather generic definition. Doreen's devilling in this instance requires:  75g/3oz butter or margarine  a teaspoon of dry mustard (I didn't have any so I used Dijon mustard paste instead)  a teaspoon of curry powder or paste  half teaspoon of ground ginger  half teaspoon of salt  1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce   These are all creamed together ready to spread on the chops when cooked. I followed Doreen's instructions and fried the chops. I spread the devilled mixture on both sides and covered th...

It's 7th January 2016 and the new year is well under way. We still have foodstuffs from Christmas: dried fruit, cheese, etc. The parsimonious streak in me has come to the fore. Yesterday I flicked through the cookery books in search of a recipe to use up some dates I'd bought for my Christmas festival cake. In Doreen Fulleylove's Simple Country Fare I found a recipe for date and walnut cookies. I doubled the quantities of the ingredients (self-raising flour, semolina, butter, caster sugar as well as the fruit and nuts). The younger offspring was favourably impressed, as were my colleagues when I brought the surplus into work. This evening I made pear and stilton soup using the recipe in The Soup Book. I first made it in August 2010. I made half the quantity, substituting a shallot for the onion and some lime juice for the lemon. Very nice, if sweeter than I expected. 

For the sake of keeping this blog alive I am making notes on some of my activities in 2015. Edmund de Waal's The White Road: A Pilgrimage of Sorts appears to be a collection of notes made as he strove to uncover the origins of porcelain while at the same time exploring the creative process. Not that I am claiming to uncover the origins of soup-making. 2015 was not a year for breaking soup-making records. I made six soups from The Soup Book : wild salmon chowder (3rd January), brandied lobster chowder (17th January), beef chilli (31st August), soupe de poissons (3rd October), chunky turkey (26th December) and minted pea and ham (28th December).  Baking Log I continued to bake frequently for fetes and other fund-raising events, baking being an activity that soothes me and the results of which bring pleasure to others.  From Martha Day's Baking :  Cherry marmalade muffins (15th January)  Orange cake (14th February) Toffee bars (16th March, 28th March and ...