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.

Q is for ...

to be honest I am not entirely sure. Lets be honest there was always going to be a letter or two for which I couldn't come up with a decent title!

So what do I use in my kitchen that begins with a 'Q'?

Well for a start there a 'quince'. A pear like fruit found in central and southern Europe and featured in the poem 'The Owl and the Pussycat'. I know of quince jam but can't  say I have ever tried it...so that is the end of that. Q is not for quince in my kitchen

Q is also not for Qinoa in my kitchen. I have seen it on the shelves, I have seen it named in recipes but I have yet to be brave enough to try it...even if it is a "complete protein" containing very good amino acids...its just not for me. Yet. 

I guess for me the most obviously choice in my kitchen is that Q is for Quick.

Cooking that is quick (and easy!) makes a whole lot of difference in any mummy's kitchen. And I am not talking about Jamie Oliver's meals in 30 minutes because, lets be honest, realistically they take 90 minutes. I am talking about those meals where recipes don't apply and that you can just throw on a plate in minutes (preferably less than five) in order to feed the hungry and occasionally angry hoards.

There are times (say 4.45pm most days) when my Little Giant is moaning because he is hungry and his energy levels are low and The Bug isn't helping things by either winding him up or deciding now is the best time to try out playing the keyboard at full volume. It's at these times when the only way I am guaranteed any silence is to tell them that dinner is ready and its like flicking a switch and as soon as the food is in their mouths they are quiet, happy and very content children.

On some days it's super easy as I may actually be prepared and already have something lovely in the oven or something to pull out the fridge and reheat from the day before. But there are days when waiting for the oven to heat so they can have fish fingers and smiley faces or cooking some sausages to go with a can of beans just won't cut it. It's these days when fresh tortellini (we call it surprise pasta)with a bit of pesto or cream cheese stirred in is your friend...that or eggy bread (which means I can have a nibble too) or an 'its and bits' tea. 

This last one is great for using up the last little bits of things, I basically put out a tasting plate of things for them to nibble on like olives, beetroot, gherkins, cheese cubes, chorizo or ham, crackers or bread soldiers, a spoonful of coleslaw or other raw fruit and veg. If you want to be really fancy you can make it into pictures. Now some of you may be thinking that they are very strange or strong flavours to be giving to children but they eat them because they have first seen us eat it and have tried it off of our plates. It really is one of the quickest meals they have and also keeps their diet varied and allows me to introduce new things in very small quantities.

L is for Leftovers

Leftovers.

Lets not just consign it to bubble and squeak...there are so many things that you can do with your leftovers.

Now I am not talking about eating the same chilli for 3 nights in a row, common sense would dictate that if you make a large chilli freeze at least half in 2 person portion containers for later in the month for an evening when you don't want to cook.  What I am talking about is all those bits and pieces from meals where you made too much that all too often get scraped out of the pan and straight into the bin without a second thought. But what if you were to save the extra pasta or rice or cut of meat for another day or another meal?

Since becoming a mummy I have learnt that even the little bits of what I or my dear husband don't eat are worth keeping - they will often be a perfect sized lunch (or at least part it) for The Two Monkeys the next day and its a time saver too. I can honestly say that when it gets to 5 to midday and the Little Giant has just woken up from his nap and is clamouring for food and I got busy doing other things with The Bug while he was sleeping...it makes me feel like I am winning at being a Mummy if I can just grab and reheat some lasagne or blend all the veggies and potatoes from last nights dinner into an instant soup.

Food waste and the amount of food waste households and supermarkets produce has been big news so far this year, along with various pieces on sell by and use by dates and funny shaped fruit and veg being discarded. But why has it taken so long for mainstream media to catch onto something that most family households already know and have probably known for decades...that often something like meat from a roast chicken on a Sunday will easily go into lunch boxes on Monday and even a stir fry on Tuesday. 

What has made our own food waste more visible is having to separate it out into a separate green caddy bin - we didn't have to do this when we were in Wimbledon, we just recycled our glass and plastics. We have the smaller caddy in the kitchen along with a biodegradable liner that once full gets put in a slightly larger one outside which is then emptied weekly. I think on average I fill the kitchen caddy twice a week  unless we have had a lot of friends over at the weekend in which case there may be more.  It hasn't been too difficult or overly smelly but I do make a point of washing both bins out each week to get rid of any nasty bacteria that may have decided to grow. I have also found since moving here with putting food waste in one bin and recycling in another I find that it takes a lot longer for our general waste bin to get full and is a real visual indicator of exactly how much we throw away in our culture.

So what is the point of this? Well, this year I am aiming to reduce, reuse and recycle more in our house and the kitchen is one of the main places in our house that I can do this.  Quite often with leftovers I just turn them into a stir fry or sandwiches but occasionally I will get quite creative. Lets be honest, if I have made a custard from scratch with egg yolks, the best thing to do with the whites is make meringues the next day and that is always a popular pudding in our house!

If you don't tend to keep food, why not try...especially with things loke stews and curries, as we all know they taste better the next day.  And if you are a food saver specialist do you have favourite recipes for your leftovers? Why not leave me a comment with your ideas as I love to swap kitchen tips!