Minnie's Soup Kitchen

Over the land is April  Coconut and pine nut cookies Over the land is April, Over my heart a rose; Over the high, brown mountain The sound of singing goes. Thanks to Robert Louis Stevenson for the title of this entry. April activity This month I made Chetna Makan's coconut and pine nut cookies. Distracted by something, I left them in the oven a little too long. Even so, I quite liked them but I'm not sure that my tasting audience was hugely impressed. Easter bark with Smarties I haven't bought a copy of Good Housekeeping for a long time so I treated myself to the April 2017 issue. There were lots of tempting chocolate cake recipes but I opted for the fairly straightforward Easter bark recipe . I made two batches: one with the suggested chopped mini eggs, the other with chopped up Smarties. These were very much appreciated by my tasting audience. Sometimes I have to remind myself of why I started writing this blog: to encourage...

Cotriade From my "make again" list Last Saturday I made cotriade again. I first followed this recipe by Marie-Pierre Moine in July 2011 and put it on my list of soups to make again. I went about it in a labour- and time-saving way, buying frozen pieces of cod and haddock rather than fresh fish, and using fish stock cubes. The spouse and I enjoyed the soup, but the younger offspring struggled to get through his portion. He eventually admitted he didn't really like fish, only shellfish. I can understand that. Cherry tomatoes ready for roasting Today I made Eric Treuille's sausage and bean soup for the second time (see 10th October 2010 ). The weather wasn't really suited to a spicy soup, but I went ahead anyway, only to be told by the younger offspring that he was going to his friend G-Banger's house when there was only twenty minutes' cooking time left. Grumpy face. Well, let him go off to the cinema with his friend. All the more for the...

Creamy Scallop Bisque I hadn't planned to make soup at the weekend of the 8th-9th December but the older offspring was at home, keeping his room tidy, and I let myself be persuaded. The recipe is by Marie-Pierre Moine and calls for dry white wine, onion, shallot, a tomato, prawns, cod or pollock, scallops, parsley, dill seeds, brandy, cream, chorizo or black pudding, and chives. One of the factors driving this choice of soup was the presence of some delicious black pudding which the spouse had bought at the National Crafts and Design Fair the previous Friday. White wine, prawns, scallops, brandy and cream can be pretty persuasive, too. Scallops, prawns and blossom fish with the younger offspring's spatula! On the Saturday morning I prepared my list. There was a little breakdown in communication regarding the type of scallops needed for the recipe but we overcame any difficulties. The spouse headed off to his favourite fishmonger 's where he was told that pollock ...

Portuguese Potato and Kale Soup What will strike you about today's soup from  The Soup Book  is how green it is. I'm remarking on it only because it starts out white. The recipe is by  Sophie Grigson , who writes that this type of soup is "ubiquitous" in Portugal. If you can't get curly kale, other options are cavolo nero or Savoy cabbage. The other ingredients are potatoes, garlic, onion and chorizo.  Potato, garlic and onion Puréed potato, garlic and onion Curly kale, washed, shredded and ready Portuguese potato and kale soup with chorizo I placed the sliced potatoes, garlic and onion in a large saucepan with water and seasoning. While these simmered, I prepared the curly kale. A fiddly operation, involving cutting out the stalks, rolling up the leaves and shredding them. By this time the potatoes were very tender so I puréed that mixture and put the bowls in the oven to warm. The last five minutes or so saw me simmering the shredded kal...

Fennel Soup with Beans, Thyme and Chorizo   It's been all go in Minnie's kitchen in the last hour. The plan was: go to shop for ingredients, make soup, wait for younger offspring to come home from after-school activities, bring him to a training session, come home later, warm up soup, have dinner and prepare for going away for the weekend. I went to the shops, arrived home, started chopping the vegetables for the soup and then the phone rang. I asked the older offspring to answer it and to tell anyone who was looking for me that I'd ring them back. It was the spouse ringing to let me know the younger offspring was at a friend's house and had hurt himself. By this time I was starting to cook the onion and fennel. I set the older offspring to stirring while I tried to phone the mother of the younger offspring's friend. It took three calls to establish that my child was not seriously injured and the older offspring was dispatched to bring him home (the spouse is away)...

 Mixed Seafood Gumbo  Yesterday (22nd April) was Good Friday. Easter is falling very late this year. I heard someone on the radio explaining why Easter Sunday is a movable feast. I'm going to list the key words rather than give an explanation: ecclesiastical full moon , astronomical full moon and vernal equinox . You do the maths. For the last twenty-two years or so I have made a simnel cake for Easter - just in case people weren't getting enough calories from their chocolate eggs. My favourite part of the cake is where the marzipan in the middle melts into the cake batter around it. I felt very organised yesterday: I put out all the listed ingredients, lined the baking tin, made the batter, rolled out the marzipan circle, put half the batter in the lined tin, put in the marzipan and topped it with the remaining batter. The oven was warm, I opened the door, and what did I see on the work surface? The unopened packets of sultanas and currants! Too late to rescue it, I put t...