Minnie's Soup Kitchen

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 ...

Beef and Green Bean Sou p   Just as it says in the title of today's entry, this soup contains beef (shoulder is recommended) and green beans. Why am I stating the obvious? It's been one of those weekends. Beautiful weather but lots of indoor jobs to do.  Anyway, before I went shopping yesterday (the spouse was working) I looked in the fridge to see what we needed and saw a packet of beans on their last day of "best before". "I'll use those up, " I thought. The other ingredients of my 115th recipe from The Soup Book were onion, potato, vegetable stock and thyme. Very simple, very suitable for a weekend with lots going on. I made the yesterday for today's dinner. First the meat had to be sealed, then the onion was fried in the meat juices. I returned the meat to the pan, poured in the stock and continued cooking. After about forty minutes it was "show time" for the potato and fifteen minutes later again, in went the beans. It tasted pre...

Pot au Feu I followed Marie-Pierre Moine 's recipe for pot au feu yesterday and the spouse, younger offspring and I had the resulting soup for our dinner this evening. The introduction says: "This classic French soup takes time to make, but is well worth waiting for." The listed ingredients include braising steak, a carrot, turnips, a waxy potato, a Spanish onion, garlic, cloves, a leek, celery, bay leaves, thyme and parsley. It is also suggested that you use beef bones, "if possible." The spouse asked for some at his usual butcher's and was given a solitary piece. I went out looking for more at a shop closer to home and the butcher kindly gave me a small selection. I continued along the road, this time in search of white turnips (we had only swede turnips) at young Stephen's. He didn't have any. Never mind. I engaged in a conversation about borscht with Stephen's assistant, and told him about the tomato borscht  I made a few months ago (se...

Beef Chilli Soup "Tonight we're having Chief Billy soup," I told the older offspring before recognising my Spoonerism. I meant to say "chilli beef", of course. This is another recipe in The Soup Book by Carolyn Humphries. The ingredients include lean minced beef, crushed dried chillies, fresh red chillies, ground cumin, dried oregano, passata, beef stock, red kidney beans and tomato puree. Humphries suggests serving the soup with tortillas and guacamole. It's a cold day today here in Dublin, so this soup was intended as a warming hearty meal with the added summery twist of guacamole. The four of us sat down to our dinner to the accompaniment of Ennio Morricone's most popular pieces of music. The soup was delicious - spicy and rich. The two older males wanted seconds but there was none left. The younger offspring wrapped as much of his soup as possible into a tortilla, added grated Cheddar cheese, guacamole and chopped coriander, and managed to eat it...