Sick-day Soup

Last week I had a horrific stomach bug so had to take the day off work. Luckily by the afternoon I was feeling better and ready to eat. Unluckily we had virtually no food in the house and I didn't want to venture outside. I desperately searched the cupboards, trying to find something other than plain pasta and managed to put together a surprisingly tasty soup with the following ingredients, I call it my ‘Sick-day Soup’:  

 

Ingredients:

Whatever vegetables, pulses and herbs you can find + vegetable stock. 

I used:

3 old celery stalks, chopped

1 small red onion, chopped (mouldy bit chopped off…yeah that’s how grim the situation was)

750ml vegetable stock

2-3 tbsp olive oil

Pinch of rosemary and black pepper

1 cup of soup mix soaked in cold water for several hours and rinsed (lentils, pearl barley etc – available in most supermarkets and health food stores, see picture below)

 Method:

1. Gently fry the onion for a few minutes, add the celery and fry for a further 5 minutes or so.

2. Stir in the soup mix, stock and herbs. Bring to the boil then simmer for 30 minutes or until the soup mix is soft. 

 3. Serve in Tupperware as you’re too sick and lazy to do the washing up.  

 I promise it tasted better than it looked...

 Also, isn't this onion just beautiful?? Just me? Like I said it was a bit mouldy in places and soft on the outer layers but when I cut into the middle it was fine so check your food before you throw it out!

 

Seasonal Scotland: Leek & Potato Soup

This is one of the first ~proper~ (i.e. from scratch) things I ever cooked and you just can’t go wrong with it. I’ve based my recipe on the one featured in 400 Soups. UK-grown leeks and potatoes* are available most of the year and last week I managed to get mine from South-East Scotland :) 

Serves approx 6 (freeze any leftovers!)

I always make Alex chop the onion :p He wears contacts!

Ingredients:

75g butter or oil

2-3 leeks, chopped

400g potatoes, chopped

1 onion, chopped

2 pints vegetable stock

Salt and pepper to taste

Method:

1. Heat up the half the butter or all the oil in a large pan then add the onion and leeks. Gently cook for a few minutes until they’ve softened up.

2. Mix in the potatoes and cook for a further few minutes.

3. Add the stock, cover, and bring to the boil. Reduce to simmer for 30 minutes.

4. Add the salt, pepper, and left over butter if using. Optional – take off the heat and liquidise all/part of it for a smoother soup (I like to whiz up a little bit of it to make it thicker).

To find out more about what fruits and vegetables are in season check out this amazing interactive calendar! I have one of Liz Cook’s wall charts on my kitchen window but like to use this electronic one too.

*Maincrop potatoes are generally harvested October-December but they can be stored for months so although not technically ‘seasonal’ (it’s nearly March now!) I’d still say this counts as a Seasonal Scotland dish!

Daal

A nice, simple daal.

I'm on a mission to make the perfect daal. While this is far from it, it's still pretty good and increadibly easy and cheap to make once you've got all the herbs and spices. This is probably the 4th draft of my recipe. Expect more.

Serves 4

Ingredients:

1lb yellow split peas or similar (lentils, pulses etc – check cooking times)

4 large chopped tomatoes or ½ tin chopped tomatoes (optional)

4 cloves garlic, crushed

2 tsp turmeric

2 tsp ground coriander

4 tsp cumin (I like a mix of ground and seeds)

2 tsp garam masala

2 tbsp butter or oil

2 tsp salt

1 tsp chilli powder

½ tsp cinnamon

Method:

1. Rinse the peas/lentils/beans and bring to the boil in a large pan of cold water. Reduce heat and simmer for 40-50 mins or until soft (soaking in advance might reduce cooking time).

2. Melt the butter/heat up the oil in a large pan. When hot gently fry the garlic for 1 minute then add the tomatoes (if using) and all the spices (if using cumin seeds fry these earlier with the garlic). Mix together for a minute or two on a high heat. 

3 Add the drained, cooked peas/lentils/beans to the spice pan (most recipes say to add the spice mix to the lentils once their water is absorbed, but I think too much of the spice mix gets left behind on the old pan this way). Mix in and serve with something yummy, like fried aubergines…