Easy recipes from Apple Tree

Tag: soup (Page 1 of 2)

Parsnip, hazelnut and apple soup

This is a really “different” soup that is good for everyday and would stand up for a dinner party starter too.

  • 100g hazelnuts, roughly chopped
  • Bunch of sage leaves (about 20)
  • 500g parsnips, peeled and chopped into 1cm cubes
  • 2 eating apples, peeled and cut into cubes
  • 4tbs oil

Heat your oven to 200C. Reserve a few sage leaves, 1 tbs of oil and 15g of nuts. Toss the rest into and oven tray and roast for 30 minutes until tender and slightly charred.

  • 1 litre vegetable stock

Remove the sage leaves from the tray and discard. On the stove top, pour the stock into the tray and bubble until the charred bits in the tray have loosened and incorporated into the liquid. Blend until smooth. If it is too thick, add some more stock.

Fry the reserved sage leaves and hazelnuts in oil until the leaves are crispy and the nuts are brown.

  • 4 tbs creme fraiche (or vegan alternative)

Serve the soup in bowls with a spoon of creme fraiche and a scatter of nuts and leaves.

 

Lamb Barley Broth

Great for a leftover lamb bone with meat attached – usually the last bit remaining after a roast day and a cold cuts day. Serves 2:

  • 1 onion, sliced
  • 2 carrots, sliced thickly
  • 1 small swede or turnip, cubed
  • 1 parsnip, cubed
  • 1 potato, cubed
  • 1 garlic clove, crushed and chopped

Put some oil or butter in a deep pan and sweat vegetables gently for about 10 minutes. Add

  • Lamb bone and leftovers, about 150g – 200g of meat
  • 4 tbs pearl barley
  • Water or stock

Add the lamb and cover with water.  Season. Simmer for 1 hour. Top up the liquid if it needs it. Pull the meat from the bone and remove the bone. Add

  • Handful of peas, green beans or similar green veg.

Simmer another 5 minutes, add some chopped fresh parley and serve in bowls with nice bread.

Best ever butternut squash soup

Ten out of ten for this one. You can use any type of squash or pumpkin but butternut is the best.

  • 1 butternut squash, peeled, seeded, cubed
  • 2 celery stalks sliced
  • 3 leeks sliced
  • 2 carrots sliced
  • 1 tsp black mustard seeds
  • 30g butter or Bertoli (or oil if you want vegan)

Chuck everything in a big pot and sweat gently for 10 minutes.

  • 1.2L light chicken (or vegetable stock to make it vegan)

Add the stock and simmer for 25 minutes. Whizz with a stick blender. Adjust seasoning and serve.

Even more incredible with Gremolata sprinkled on top:

  • 1 tbs parsley chopped finely
  • 2 cloves garlic chopped finely
  • zest of one lemon

Mix the above. That is Gremolata. Sprinkle on meat and fish to zap it up a bit if it needs it.

 

Real (ish) Tomato Soup

Quick too!

  • 2 sticks celery
  • 1 onion
  • 2 carrots
  • 2 cloves garlic

Chop and sweat in a dash of olive oil for 10 minutes

  • 2 tins good quality tomatoes (that is the -ish bit)
  • 6 proper tomatoes
  • 1 litre vegetable stock (a stock cube is fine)

Simmer 15 minutes

Add a small handful of fresh basil leaves and whizz with a stick blender. Adjust the seasoning and job done. Idea to table in 30 minutes. From a Jamie Oliver recipe. Great with our Irish Soda Bread recipe as you can see in the picture.

Caldo Verde (Chorizo and Kale)

Tastes even better than I hoped. This is a thick, rich tasty bowl of soup/stew from Portugal that is a meal in a bowl with bread on the side. Enough here for 6 small bowls or 4  full-on meals.

  • 1 onion
  • 1 garlic clove
  • 600g floury potatoes peeled and cut into small chunks
  • 220g chorizo cut into chunks
  • 1.5 litres vegetable stock
  • 300g kale finely shredded
  • olive oil
  • Dried chilli flakes

Heat the oil in a deep pan. Gently fry the onion and garlic until starting to soften. Add the chorizo to cook a bit and release their oil. Add the potato and stock, bring to the boil and simmer 20 minutes. Mush the potatoes down with a masher to make the soup thick. Add the kale, a teaspoon of salt and a mad twist of black pepper. Cook 8 minutes more. Serve in bowls and sprinkle chilli flakes on top.

Pumpkin and Sweetcorn Soup

This is made once a year in our house, using the remains of Mr Pumpkinhead above.

  • 750g to 1kg pumpkin, seeds and skin removed (and grit and candle wax) and cut into chunks.
  • 1 onion, chopped
  • 500g sweetcorn, frozen is fine
  • 750ml vegetable (vegan) or chicken stock
  • 250ml milk (or vegan equivilent)
  • oil or butter for frying

Method: sweat the onion in a heavy based saucepan for 5 minutes. Add the pumpkin, sweat 5 minutes more. Add stock and milk, and 300g of the sweetcorn. Simmer very gently for 20 minutes.  Meanwhile, fry the rest of the sweetcorn on a hot pan in butter or oil or under a grill until it looks a bit tinged brown. When the soup is done, zap with a blender or stick. Adjust the seasoning, pour into bowls and top with the toasted sweetcorn.

Parsnip Soup

Another easy one.

  • 250gm parsnips, peeled and chopped
  • 1 potato, peeled and chopped
  • 1 tablespoon curry paste
  • 800ml vegetable stock
  • 120ml cream
  • Butter/oil

You know what is coming – all soups are made more or less the same way. First sweat the veg in the oil for 5 minutes. Add the curry paste and sweat another minute or two. Add the stock and simmer for 20 – 30 minutes or until the vegetables are very soft.  Blitz in a blender or with a stick. Stir in the cream, reheat and serve. You can also make this with parsnip and potato leftovers (now there’s a Christmas idea…)

Anyveg Soup

Like it says. You can make soup out of almost anything veggie, but a mixture is safest. For example, roots: carrot, onion, potato, parsnip, swede.

  • 1Kg mixed veg, cleaned and chopped roughly
  • 1 litre vegetable stock from a cube or powder
  • Oil or butter
  • salt and pepper to adjust seasonings (depends on your stock)

Method:

Heat oil gently in a large saucepan.

Sweat root vegetable for 5-10 minutes, other veg 2-5 minutes. Pour in the hot stock and simmer for 30-40 minutes. Zap with a blender or stick, then adjust the seasoning. Some stock cubes can be quite salty. You can also swirl in some cream and sprinkle on chopped fresh parsley for a posh touch.

Blanker’s Broth (Prawn and Pepper Chowder)

It happens to all of us – we have great plans for a fish supper but catch nothing. It would be just too much to pay for stale fish of the species we catch, so the only thing to do is to buy something we don’t usually catch – in this case prawns, and possibly a tin of anchovies. For four people you will need:

  • 1 large onion, chopped
  • 2 rashers of bacon, chopped
  • 1 clove of garlic, crushed
  • 1 large (or 2 small) red peppers, seeded and finely chopped
  • 225g tomatoes, skinned and chopped (or cheat and use a tin)
  • 900ml chicken stock
  • 1 bay leaf
  • 40g long-grain rice
  • 1 tablespoon wine vinegar
  • 50g peeled prawns, chopped
  • 1 tablespoon chopped parsley
  • handful of whole peeled and cooked prawns
  • Olive oil
  • Salt and pepper

Fry the onion, bacon and garlic gently in oil until soft. Add almost all of the minced peppers and continue frying for 2-3 minutes. Add the tomatoes, stock, rice, vinegar, bay leaf, salt and pepper, and simmer, covered, for 25 minutes until it is all soft and mingled. Discard the bay leaf, and add the chopped prawns and parsley. Simmer for another 6 minutes. Serve in warm bowls, garnished with whole prawns and the remaining chopped red pepper.

Where did those anchovies come in you may ask? If you like the salty flavour, try anchovy bread with it. Take a French baton loaf, and make an anchovy butter by mashing a tin of anchovies with 100g of unsalted butter. Cut slits in the bread and stuff the slits with anchovy butter, as you would for garlic bread. Wrap in foil, and bake in an oven at 180deg C for 15 minutes

Carrot and Coriander Soup

This is for when someone bought more carrots when we already had a bag. This makes enough for four large bowls:

  • 500g carrots, sliced. No need to peel, just wash grit off
  • 1 onion
  • 1/2 tsp ground coriander
  • 1.25 litres vegetable stock (I use Marigold bouillon powder)
  • Chopped fresh coriander

This is very easy. Just chop the onion and sweat in butter or oil in a heavy pan for a few minutes. Add the ground coriander, sweat for another minute then add the stock. Bring to the boil and simmer covered for 30 minutes. Whiz in a blender or use a stick blender. Taste and adjust the seasoning. Chop and add the fresh coriander. Tastes very carroty!

Very nice with bread and cheese from Cowdray farm shop….

Bread

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