S is for Soup

I love soup.

It's giving like giving your body a hug from the inside out.  

It's seasonal cooking at its best and is great at turning the odd parsnip, half a swede and few potatoes into a feast. 

I am even feeling happier just writing these first few sentences.

It is the perfect accompaniment to a blustery autumn day, and autumn has definitely started to make it's presence known. The days may still be warm but the mornings are chilly and the evenings are cold enough that it warranted a few minutes conversation with our cat on the back door step last night about whether he really wanted to stay outside, or come back in and snuggle up on the foot of our bed.

But I digress.

Soup is delicious, nutritious, and comes in so many flavours and guises.

Clear broth or thick and creamy. Chunky vegetable or smooth. With or without croutons (silly question that)

And it can be a super quick meal if you have some in a can...so it gets bonus points for that.

In fact, one of my most favourite soups is the legendary "Cream of Tomato" by Heinz, but since shopping at Lidl we have tried their version of it and guess what? You can barely tell the difference; pretty much the same taste and definitely the same orange/red colour. 

Now this particular flavour of canned soup has been a favourite since I was very very small and has stayed with me to this day. However when I was a teenager one of my friends revolutionised this soup for me and it changed me for life...although I don't think I ever told her this...I would like to share this story with you. 

As the story goes we were in our mid teens, and I cant remember if it was a weekend or holiday or if we were on study leave but we were at said friends house and got a bit peckish as teenagers do so set about making lunch. A can of soup was opened and put on the stove, bowls were taken out of the cupboard but then my friend opened the fridge and pulled out some cheese.   Needless to say I was baffled as I watched said friend cut up the cheese into tiny chunks and put them at the bottom of each bowl and then pour the hot soup (tomato...obviously) over the cheese.

I was astounded...as I ate my soup I would get the occasional mouthful of molten cheese and it was amazing and as long as I don't have a cheese sandwich to dip in my tomato soup (more on that in a moment) I always put cheese in my tomato soup now. So Hannah, if you are reading (*waves*) thank you very much for introducing cheese in tomato soup for me 

But what about soup not from a can? 

Thankfully my tastes and ability in the kitchen have come a long way since I was a teenager. I cannot resist a properly topped off French onion soup and a chicken noodle soup is the best medicine when you have the flu.

I am lucky that my boys are not fussy eaters and home made vegetable soup is a big hit in my house with the Two Monkeys as long as there is bread or a cheese sandwich to dip in it.  I often have those half baked baguettes in the cupboard or freezer and after 10 minutes in the oven they are ready to go and having smothered them in butter they are a great side to most soups. 

Just remember that anything goes when it comes to soup...made with fresh ingredients or left overs, it really doesn't matter.

I have had a few recent hits in the kitchen with some of my soups so wanted to share them with you - one is a time saver and the other a left over user upper.

So the time saver soup was made on a Sunday, as usual the boys were up at 6am (ish) and we go to church as a family at about 10.30am.  This does mean that I have a lot of time to get things done before we go but am often rushed to get lunch for my very hungry boys on our return. This particular sunday I knew I had a heap of root vegetables that needed using and a spare half hour in which to make something before we left the house. I got out my trusty cast iron pan (which also happens to be our most enduring wedding present) and fried up a large sliced onion, added in very roughly chopped carrots, white potatoes, sweet potatoes and two squashed garlic cloves. I maybe sautéed them for about two minutes before covering with freshly boiled water so everything was just covered. Add in a stock cube and put the lid on. I then put the whole thing in the oven at 120 and set the oven to turn off after 90 minutes. We returned home from church and the kitchen smelt lovely and all that was left for me to do was use our stick blender to purree the contents of the pan along with some fresh herbs from the garden and fry up some bacon to go on top. Now this last bit makes any soup a winner with my dear husband  as a meal isn't a meal unless it has meat so I always keep streaky bacon in the fridge just for this purpose...plus it adds some saltiness to the soup too.

Now of course this time saver can be made with all sorts of other vegetables and could be left in the oven once cooked for any amount of time until you are ready to eat it.

My left over user upper soup happened as quite a mistake...but a happy one.

I had made a lovely dish of sag aloo (that's an Indian dish made with potatoes, onions and spinach with spices) to go with a curry over the weekend and 5 days later I still had a large portion left in the fridge. Rather than relinquishing it to the food bin, I boiled up some carrots (yes they are a staple base of many of my soups) and blended them along with the potato dish.

The result was a lovely green curried soup which went brilliantly with a few sunflower seeds sprinkled on top...the Two Monkeys devoured it. Well OK, they both ate most of it but my Little Giant did end up with a good helping of it over his face and hands but nothing a quick wipe down couldn't solve. I was so surprised at how much I enjoyed it too that this will definitely feature again on our menu.

So with the weather supposedly on the turn this weekend for something a bit more wet and windy, why not find out a new soup recipe to try. I have already spotted a fabulous crab and noodle soup over at The Pie Patch today which I am looking forward to sampling.