Minnie's Soup Kitchen

Two Soups Celeriac and Bramley apple soup ingredients Last Saturday (27th February) I made celeriac and Bramley apple soup using Tom Kerridge's recipe in his book Proper Pub Food . I should have ended up with enough soup for 4-6 people but I was lucky to get two bowls. Because I'd used too much celeriac, once I had processed the cooked mixture, the resulting soup looked liked stodgy porridge. I strained as much as I could and it was very tasty indeed, especially with the crumbled Roquefort and chopped walnuts. Celeriac and Bramley apple soup with walnuts and Roquefort cheese Ingredients for butternutsquash soup and tomato salsa The next day I made roasted garlic and butternut squash soup with tomato salsa from Complete Comfort Food (edited by Bridget Jones). Lots of nice ingredients: whole garlic bulbs to be roasted, thyme, squash and ground coriander in the soup; tomatoes, red pepper and red chilli in the salsa. Much to my surprise, I have just found a ve...

Corn and Crab Soup with Coriander Last weekend I dipped into one of those books that sits on my kitchen bookshelves waiting to be pulled out, dusted off and put to use: The Essential Seafood Cookbook  edited by Wendy Stephen.  I'm not sure why I chose this recipe - perhaps I liked the idea of the tang of lemon grass and ginger together with crab (tinned) and coconut milk. Other ingredients included garlic, Asian shallots (I stuck with western shallots), chicken stock, frozen sweetcorn kernels, fish sauce, lime juice and brown sugar. Unfortunately, the spouse wasn't able to find fresh coriander. I did my prep work. I added chopped garlic, shallots and lemon grass and grated ginger to heated oil in a pan. Next in were the stock and coconut milk. Then in went the sweetcorn. The last additions were the crab meat, fish sauce, lime juice and sugar. The four of us sat down to sup. I was a little disappointed by the blandness of the soup, despite the appetite-whetting spice an...

Split Pea and Bacon Soup Last Sunday was another sunny day in Dublin so why did I make a hearty winter's day soup? Partly because I had the packet of split green peas from last weekend and partly because I love bacon-flavoured meals. The other ingredients included smoked streaky bacon, celeriac, carrot, leek, potato, dried marjoram and onion. The first task was to get the peas cooking in water. Then in went the piece of bacon. In the meantime I sliced and diced the vegetables and added them to the peas with some marjoram. When the bacon was cooked, I took it out of the pan, chopped it up and it back in the pan. I fried the onion in a second pan and then I was ready to dish up. I stirred the fried onions into the soup and sprinkled chopped chives over the top of each bowlful. Verdict: Delicious. I'll definitely make this soup again one cold winter's day. Bee is for Baking I've been very busy lately and haven't had much time for doing some of the things I l...

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. ...

Celeriac and Hazelnut Soup   My first choice of soup yesterday was actually German potato soup and I would have made it if Young Stephen had had chanterelles in stock. The first time I ever saw these mushrooms was when I was a teenager on holiday in Normandy. The family I was staying with brought me out to pick mushrooms and I was astonished to discover that this bright yellow fungus was edible. As far as I can remember, the chanterelles were cooked in an omelette. Anyway, I brought my copy of The Soup Book with me to Stephen's. His assistant "Marek" apologised for not having any chanterelles (I think they had dried ones), so I whipped out the book to find a different recipe. Don't ask me why I thought of celeriac. I reminded Marek about when I talked to him about tomato borscht (see my blog of 2nd July 2011) and showed him the recipe. (I wonder how many other customers show him their recipe books.) By this time Stephen had appeared and told me that when all t...

Cheddar and Chive Soup The recipe for today's soup is by Carolyn Humphries , who suggests that you serve the soup with "plenty of warm, crusty bread." Cheddar and chive soup is the last of four from the cheese section of The Soup Book and calls for celeriac, onion, carrots, potato, vegetable or chicken stock, bay leaf, chive, milk, Cheddar soup, and creme fraiche. I have plenty of chives in my back garden: they seed themselves, seem to grow easily and I don't often use them. The flowers are quite pretty and are attractive to bees so I let them be.  The only ingredient I didn't have was celeriac so I had to pop down to Young Stephen's to buy one. Back at home I prepped the vegetables and got on with the first stage of the soup. This involved frying the root vegetables, adding the stock and bay leaf, simmering the mixture, and pureeing (yes, I had to get out the food processor). In the second stage you add the finely snipped chives, milk, cheese and creme fr...

Camembert and Potato Soup   Yes, I know it's only Tuesday and only two days after my last soup-making foray, but I haven't gone back to work yet. I have time on my hands and food in the fridge to be put to good use. I'm having a thrift extravaganza: today I made turkey stock with the bone of the turkey leg the spouse bought the other day and any carrots, celery, spring onions and other items that were beginning to fade. I used the scraps of turkey meat to make a delicious turkey and red onion flan (the red onions were substituted for the leeks suggested in the recipe, but what do I care when I'm using up vegetables?). The Soup Book recipe calls this soup Camembert and celeriac soup with cranberry swirl , but in her introduction Carolyn Humprhies suggests substituting potatoes. I didn't have celeriac but I did have potatoes. And I was being thrifty. Other ingredients include onion, chicken or vegetable stock (I used my freshly made turkey stock), milk, Camembert...

Celery and Celeriac Soup Yesterday (Saturday 13th March) was the day for making soup. I've realised, by the way, that as I tend to prepare this blog over several days, I need to put in dates for the various activities or events I report on. During the week I spotted celeriac in the local green grocer's. As I've never cooked celeriac before I thought it might be a good choice for this weekend's soup. On arriving home I got out The Soup Book and checked the possibilities: Camembert and celeriac, celeriac and hazelnut, the intriguingly titled "soup of the first and last", and celery and celeriac. So, being one for a little alliteration, I chose the last. The ingredients include the eponymous vegetables, potato, and vegetable or chicken stock. The suggested accompaniment is walnut bread. Apparently, celeriac ( Apium graveolens rapaceum ) is also known as 'celery root,' 'turnip-rooted celery' or 'knob celery' (see Wikipedia). An article en...