Pumpkin, carrot and beetroot soup

Pumpkins are plentiful at this time of the year so I made a soup that will give you a bumper dose of the important anti-oxidant beta carotene. It was delicious!

Ingredients

Pumpkin, diced
Carrots
Beetroots
Trimmed leeks
A couple of potatoes
Dry white wine
Paprika
Chicken bouillon
Onion and garlic
A small amount of grated ginger
Salt & pepper to taste.

Preparation

Dice onions, chop garlic, cut all vegetables into chunks. I didn't give exact amounts of anything, you can vary according to taste and how much soup you're making. In a large pan, fry the onions until golden. Add the veggies, mix well, add the garlic, paprika, ginger, white wine and enough bouillon for the amount of vegetables. Adjust seasoning. Simmer for about 1 hour. Check that everything is cooked, whizz the lot in a blender, re-heat gently, taste and adjust seasoning and serve.

The colour of this soup is something to behold! I forgot to take a photo of my own soup, but the one in the photo above looks quite similar to what we enjoyed the other evening.

Potato, leek and watercress soup

The chill in the weather has inspired me to make soups! This one turned out incredibly delicious although the ingredients are very simple.

Ingredients

8 medium potatoes
3 medium leeks, trimmed
A generous handful of watercress
1 large onion
2 cloves of garlic
Some parsley
Chicken bouillon (I used a very nice bouillon they sell in cubes over here)
Salt & pepper to taste

Preparation

Scrub and chop the potatoes into chunks, slice the leeks, dice the onions, chop the garlic. Fry the onions in a large pan with some olive oil. Add potatoes and leeks, mix well, add garlic, mix and add the bouillon. Add more water to nearly fill the pan. Season with salt & pepper to taste, reduce to a moderate simmer and cook for about 45 minutes. Add the watercress and parsley, just long enough to wilt, then put the lot into a blender (I had to do it in two batches), whizz it well, return to the pan to reheat it a little bit, taste and adjust seasoning and serve with crackers or French bread.

We had seven bowls of soup between the two of us (not all at once!).

Nutrition tip

Watercress is very good for cleansing the lungs and it's a rich source of vitamin C, calcium, folic acid, potassium and beta-carotene.

Leeks are rich in minerals: iron, potassium, magnesium, copper and calcium. They are low in calories and also contain a lot of different vitamins: A, B1, B2, B3, B9 (folic acid) and C.

Potatoes are rich in potassium (concentrated in the skin), vitamins A, B and flavonoids (good antioxidants). Without lashings of butter, potatoes are not fattening, as they are 70/80% water.

Thrifty chicken soup

The weather decided to cool down considerably, which calls for... soup!

When I cooked Caroline's Chicken about 10 days ago, I ended up with 12 thigh bones, still with some meat attached to them, so into the freezer they went, waiting for last night. Peter loves soup and was a happy bunny when offered a large bowl (or two) of turbo-charged chicken soup.

I used the veggies I had in the fridge. If I had more, I would have used them too. Leeks spring to mind...

Ingredients

Chicken bones (I used the 12 I saved, but you can use a lot less or it can be a saved chicken carcass from the Sunday roast, for example. You may also use a couple of thighs, not just the bones)
2 medium potatoes
2 carrots
2 medium turnips
1 large onion
2 small beetroots
Some tomato juice or purée (not much, just enough to add some tang and colour)
2 cloves of garlic
A generous dash of Worcestershire sauce
1 or 2 glasses of dry wine, white or rosé ( I used rosé because that's what I had in the fridge)
Herbs: I chose tarragon, but you may prefer parsley, oregano, basil, whatever tickles your tastebuds.
A sprinkling of ground cinnamon
Some sweet paprika
Salt & pepper to taste

1 cup of rice (more or less, depending on how much soup you're making. You want the grains swimming in the liquid, not a mushy mess)

Preparation

Chop the garlic and dice the onion. Dice all the vegetables. Fry the onions in some olive oil in a large pan until golden. Add the chicken and mix well. Add the garlic, the herbs, spices, salt, the Worcestershire sauce, stir some more. Add the wine to deglaze, add sufficient water, bring to the boil then reduce to a simmer. Taste, adjust and cook for around 1 hour.

Take the bones out, saving as much meat as possible. Discard the bones, then put everything in the blender, whizz very well and return to the pan (if you blender is powerful, don't worry about leaving some cartilage, it all disappears and it's good for you). Bring the soup back to a gentle boil, add the rice. Wait for a bit, reduce to a simmer and make sure there's no rice stuck to the bottom of the pan. It's a good idea to stir it occasionaly, so the rice doesn't stick to the bottom. When the rice is cooked, taste again, adjust seasoning and serve with French bread or crackers. You may use those tiny pasta shapes for soups as a variation.

The strange looking thing in the small bowl may look disgusting, but it's a very tasty banana dessert. I'll post the recipe later.

As I had all those bones, I ended up making a large pan of soup, but Peter had two large bowls last night (I had the one you see in the skewy photo above, not filled to the brim like Peter's) and we had the rest for lunch today, with crispy bacon, rye bread and some St Agur cheese on the side.

(One day I'll learn to photograph food like they do in the recipe books... but they cheat and spray all sorts of things on the food to make it look good.)

Prawn Bisque

I served this yummy bisque for my husband's birthday and it was a success! The beauty of this recipe is that nothing is wasted and the results are delicious.

Ingredients

Allow 3 or 4 large prawns per person. (I used pre-cooked)
2 or 3 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
1 carrot
1 leek (white bits only)
1 pint fish stock (I didn't have any, so used a chicken stock cube!)
2 glasses of dry white wine
4 heaped tbspoons of double cream
1 or 2 tbspoons of sweet paprika (you may add more later, for colour)
salt and pepper to taste

Cooking

Remove heads and shells of prawns, leaving the tail. Place all the debris in the pan, together with the chopped carrot and leek, the garlic and all the rest. Adjust the quantity of water according to the number of guests. Bring to the boil, then reduce the heat and simmer for 1 hour. Strain through a fine sieve, pressing to extract all the juices. Return to pan, add the cream (you can vary the quantity for thickness and colour, as you wish), heat gently, taste, adjust seasoning and serve with French bread.

Presentation

I seasoned the prawns with lemon, pepper, garlic, parsley and olive oil after I finished beheading and shelling them, then hooked them to the rim of the soup bowls. A sprig of dill or parsley completes the presentation.

Voilà!

My friend posted a photo of our group with the prawn bisque on Facebook. It doesn't look as glamorous as the one from the recipe book, but hey, it was nice enough...