COURGETTE SOUP

Since my previous courgette soup post I have discovered numerous versions of the recipe for courgette and cheese triangle soup.  In fact I am amazed that I had never come across it before.  Keen to have another go at it I popped down to Tesco for some ingredients.  

However I was shocked to find most of the chiller and freezer cabinets empty!  The current heatwave seems to have caused a problem and they had been cleared.  Fortunately the cheese section was still functioning so I was able to get my “Laughing Cow” triangles. 

Like so many recipes, there are lots of different versions of it.  My friend who first told me about the soup gave me her recipe and she adds crème fraîche at the end for even more creaminess.  She cooks the courgettes in stock, not butter.  Some recipes add the cheese triangles at the start, some melt them in at the end of cooking.  Others include garlic, onion or spring onion.  In the end I took elements from a number of recipes and it was delicious; a delicate flavour and gorgeous creamy texture.

I ate it warm on day one and cold from the fridge with some chopped chives as garnish on day two.

Ingredients

5 courgettes, wiped (mine were huge so I used 3)

5 Laughing Cow or other cheese triangles

3 tsp Marigold stock powder, or a stock cube or pot

2 large knobs of butter

chopped chives or spring onions to garnish (optional)

Method

Melt the butter in a large saucepan.  Chop the unpeeled courgettes and cook gently in the butter on low heat until beginning to soften.  This is the stage at which many recipes add a chopped onion, chopped spring onions or crushed garlic.  I omitted them.

Add the stock powder and cover with water.  Stir well and simmer gently, covered, for about ten minutes until the courgettes are tender.  Add the cheese triangles and stir until they are melted in.

Blend in the pan using a stick blender (or transfer to a food processor/blender) and blend until smooth.  Season with salt and pepper to taste and serve warm or cold.  Garnish with chopped chives or spring onions (optional)

Serves 4

CREAMY COURGETTE AND LEEK SOUP (soupmaker recipe)

 

A friend was waxing lyrical recently about a soup that she used to order in a local restaurant, now long since closed.  The chef divulged the recipe to her and she makes it for herself in a saucepan fairly often.  It seemed to consist of principally courgettes and cheese triangles!

With some courgettes and cheese triangles in stock I decided to have a go and see if I could make it in the soupmaker.  I added a leek and some potatoes because I thought it could be quite bland and a bit thin without them.

It turned out to be a delicious soup with a delicate flavour.  It wasn't especially cheesy but very creamy.  Definitely one to make again and a neat trick in using the cheese triangles to add creaminess.

Ingredients

2 large courgettes, washed

1 leek, washed

2 medium potatoes

4 cheese triangles (such as Laughing Cow)

1 vegetable stock pot

Method

Prepare and chop enough veg to fill the machine to the bottom line.

Add the cheese triangles, the stockpot and enough water to fill to the top line.

Cook on smooth.  Season to taste when done.

Makes 4 generous portions or 6 as a starter.

PARSNIP AND ARTICHOKE SOUP (soup maker recipe)

 

As we enjoyed the carrot and artichoke soup so much, I decided to make it again.  That's when I noticed the one large parsnip in the veg drawer and wondered how it would turn out if I used that instead of carrots.

In France there is a chain of greengrocer shops called "Terre Y Fruits".  They sell excellent seasonal fruit and veg, plus some meat and dairy products and other groceries, much of it local.  There I spotted some Jerusalem artichokes that were a much more user friendly shape to peel so I bought some.

It turned out to be a delicious combination.  The soup was a lovely creamy colour and the flavour more delicate than the carrot version.  I will definitely be making this again!

I served mine with some home made air fryer croutons, made from the previous day's baguette.  You can see the recipe/instructions for those in this post here.

Ingredients

1 large onion

1 stick celery 

sufficient Jerusalem artichokes and parsnips to fill the machine to the bottom line, about half and half of each

1 vegetable stock pot 

1 good squirt garlic paste or purée 

1 tblsp dry sherry

1/2 tsp grated nutmeg 

Method

Peel and roughly chop the onion.  Clean and roughly chop the celery.  Add both to the soup maker.

Peel and roughly chop the parsnips and artichokes and add enough to fill the soup maker to the bottom line.  You can vary the proportions depending on how many of each you have but I used half and half.

Add the stock pot, garlic paste and enough water to fill to the top line.  Season well with salt and pepper.

Cook on smooth.

When done, check the seasoning and stir in the sherry and nutmeg.

A tip for grating nutmeg: grate the amount you want onto a chopping board or plate then tip it into the soup. This saves having to go fishing in the soup for the nutmeg when you drop it!

Makes 4 generous servings.  Would serve 6 as a starter.

CARROT AND ARTICHOKE SOUP (soup maker recipe)

Topinambours, the French word for Jerusalem artichokes, are in plentiful supply at the moment and I couldn’t resist a bagful when we breezed through the market in the wintry drizzle the other week. I have made Palestine soup many times (see here) but decided to have a look in my soup book for an alternative recipe.

This book was a charity shop purchase a couple of years ago and appeared to be brand new.  It’s crammed with excellent recipes for delicious soups, most of which can be adapted for the soup maker.  This time added my "secret ingredient" which is a splash of dry sherry and a good grating of nutmeg - a tip I learned from Nigella Lawson's recipe for vegetable soup in her book "How to Eat" (see here).  I have found it enhances the flavour of most vegetable soups!

A carrot and just one knobbly artichoke!

Next time I think I would hand pick my own artichokes.  Those I got from the market were very knobbly and the devil’s own job to peel!

My Morphy Richards soup maker, which apparently "died" in the middle of last year is now working perfectly!  Why that happened is a mystery but I'm happy for now that it’s still going strong!

Ingredients

1 large onion

1 stick celery 

sufficient Jerusalem artichokes and carrots to fill the machine to the bottom line, about half and half of each

1 vegetable stock pot 

1 good squirt garlic paste or purée 

1 tblsp dry sherry

1/2 tsp grated nutmeg 

Method

Peel and roughly chop the onion.  Clean and roughly chop the celery.  Add both to the soup maker.

Peel and roughly chop the carrots and artichokes and add enough to fill the soup maker to the bottom line.  You can vary the proportions depending on how many of each you have but I used half and half.

Add the stock pot, garlic paste and enough water to fill to the top line.  Season well with salt and pepper.

Cook on smooth.

When done, check the seasoning and stir in the sherry and nutmeg.

A tip for grating nutmeg: grate the amount you want onto a chopping board or plate then tip it into the soup. This saves having to go fishing in the soup for the nutmeg when you drop it!

Makes 4 generous servings.  Would serve 6 as a starter.

BEAN SOUP (soup maker recipe)

This was a very tasty soup.

At this time of year I have a clear out of our food cupboards.  At the back of a cupboard I found this bag of dried white haricot beans.  They were just past their sell by so it was time to use them up!  The next day I looked in my recipe books for things to do with beans and came up with bean soup, perfect for the freezing cold weather we were having last week.

What I hadn't bargained for was that the dried beans had to be soaked overnight before they could be cooked.  I should have realised this as it's exactly what we now do with our mushy peas so I wrote it on the pack of beans to remind me!  (I have never seen mushy peas for sale in France and instead of bringing tins of them from the UK I bring packs of dried marrowfat peas which I then cook and freeze in portions.)

A rummage at the back of the pantry shelves turned up a tin of pre cooked beans so we could still have the soup. 

Another thing I found in the cupboard was a pack of half baked demi baguettes that were just at their sell by date.  These are very handy to have in stock for when you want nice crusty bread and the boulangerie is shut or the baguette machine in the village has sold out.  I always make sure we have some in stock.  They’re not quite as delicious as a fresh baguette but better than none at all!

The soup was cooked in the soup maker on the "chunky" function which means it's all boiled up but not blended.  Consequently I chopped the veg smaller than usual as that's the size the chunks were going to be in the finished soup.  As the blender function is not used you could simply cook the soup in a saucepan!

It was delicious, definitely a keeper and Nick declared it one of the best soups I had ever made.  It was just the job for a chilly day when we didn’t want to head to the shops on slippery roads.

Ingredients

1 400g tin chopped tomatoes

1 400g tin haricots blancs or cannellini beans, drained and well rinsed

1 large onion, peeled and finely chopped

2 medium carrots, peeled and chopped into small dice

2 sticks celery, washed and thinly sliced

2 cloves garlic, peeled and finely chopped

1 vegetable stock pot

1 tsp mixed herbs

Method 

Put all the ingredients into the soup maker with enough water to fill to the top line.  Give it all a good stir.  (Or put it all into a large saucepan with a litre of water and bring to the boil gently, cover and cook for 15-20 minutes, stirring occasionally, or until the carrots are tender.)

Cook on the chunky setting.

If the carrots are still slightly firm, stir the soup and give it another few minutes on "chunky".

Serve with warm, crusty baguette.

Makes 4 generous servings.

COURGETTE, CAULIFLOWER AND BLUE CHEESE SOUP (soup maker recipe)

With a large chunk of our giant courgette still in the veg drawer I decided to make soup for lunch.  Courgettes have very little flavour so I added about half a cauliflower and the usual mix of soup veg, stirring in the cheese once it was cooked.

I used the spreadable blue cheese that I get in France (delicious on crusty bread, crackers or toast) and I don't know if anything similar is available in the UK as I have never looked for it but any blue cheese crumbled into the just cooked soup so that it melts would work.  It was a delicious, delicately flavoured soup, perfect for the season.

You may also like another blue cheese soup recipe, using cauliflower leaves and broccoli stalks which you can see here.

Ingredients

1 large onion

2 medium potatoes

1 courgette

½ a cauliflower

1 vegetable stock pot (I used garlic and thyme)

a squirt of garlic paste (optional)

1 tblsp blue cheese spread (or a chunk of any blue cheese, crumbled)

Method

Prepare and chop enough veg to fill the machine to the bottom line.

Add the stock pot and garlic paste and enough water to fill to the top line.

Cook on the smooth setting

Makes 4 generous servings

GAZPACHO SOUP and how to peel tomatoes

With Nick away for a week I was looking forward to catching up with spring cleaning and other jobs.  Unfortunately the weather had other ideas.   We are having a prolonged heatwave here in the middle of France.  It's debilitatingly hot so I got much less done but I did get several invitations to eat out. 😄 Some of the invites clashed but I accepted as many as were physically possible and on one day had lunch with a couple of friends and dinner with a large group of others celebrating a move of house.  (The term for this is apparently a "house cooling", which is ironic considering the extremely warm weather!)

At both of these the meal began with Gazpacho, something I have eaten often but never made and is perfect for the hot weather.  It’s delicious and refreshing.  With another invite on the cards and all the stars aligned I decided it was time to have a go at making it myself and offered to bring the starter.

There are dozens of recipes out there in the ether, and on my bookshelves, and I consulted several, including one by Mary Berry from "Mary Makes it Easy" and one by David Herbert from "The Really Useful Cookbook".  I also took on board my friend's adaptations for the soup she served at lunch.  

Of the two gazpachos I had in one day, one of them clearly had bread in it and the other not.  I thought my soup turned out a bit too thick so next time I would probably halve the amount of bread and see how it goes.  I might even leave it out altogether (but still add the water) and see which version I like the best.

Most of the recipes said that the tomatoes should be peeled.  I have never peeled a tomato in my life before and whilst it's not difficult, it's rather tedious and a bit fiddly.  Hence I've given the recipe two stars in how faffy it is!

This is how I made mine.

Ingredients

1kg tomatoes, the riper the better, or about 6 large tomatoes

½ a large cucumber (unpeeled)

1 red pepper, de-seeded

55g white bread, no crusts (see notes above and maybe try 30g or just a chunk)

250ml water

2 cloves of garlic, peeled (3 cloves if you like your soup very garlicky)

½ a red onion, peeled

2 tblsp good quality olive oil

2 tblsp balsamic vinegar

1 tblsp tomato purée

1 tsp sugar

salt and pepper

extra olive oil and chopped cucumber for serving

Method

Put the chunks of bread into a bowl with the water and set aside to soak while you deal with the veg.

To peel the tomatoes

Cut a cross in the bottom of each one (i.e. the opposite end to the stalk) and put into a large Pyrex or similar bowl.  Cover with boiling water and leave for 45 seconds.  Transfer to a similar bowl containing cold water (tap water temperature is fine).  Using a small pointed knife such as a paring knife pick up the point of one section of the peel where you cut the cross in a tomato and drag the peel downwards away from the tomato to remove it.  

Prepare all the veg by washing or wiping, peeling where appropriate and chop medium small.

Put all the ingredients into a large bowl, including the soaked bread, and stir well.  Transfer in batches to a food processor or blender and blend until it's as smooth as you would like it.  (You could of course use a stick blender in a suitable container.)  Mine had tiny chunks of veg in it.  Other recipes say to keep going until the soup is smooth.  To quote James Martin "it's entirely up to you"!

Transfer the blended soup to a large jug or container and chill in the fridge for several hours.  I added a few ice cubes before serving to chill further.

The soup looks very nice served in a large glass jug at the table, pouring out into small soup bowls or glass bowls.  Add a drizzle of olive oil to each one and a few bits of veg, chopped small for garnish.  I added chopped cucumber but you could use green pepper, avocado, tomato or, as some recipes suggest, chopped hard boiled egg (this sounded a bit odd to me!).

Serves 8-10 small portions, 6-8 slightly larger.

(I brought the leftovers home with me and the soup was still good two days later, which suggests that it could easily be made and left chilling in the fridge the day before you need it.)

VEG DRAWER SOUP and the death of a soup maker

This very basic vegetable soup has always been one of my favourites.  It uses all the bits and pieces in the veg drawer that could very easily be destined for the compost heap but instead you get a very tasty virtually free lunch.  You can use more or less any veg you have as long as it has something that will thicken the soup such as potatoes or any root veg.  My selection is influenced by the very first vegetable soup I ever made, years ago, to a recipe by Nigella Lawson.

Unfortunately during the cooking programme my soup maker seems to have died.  When it got to the blending stage there was just a weak humming noise.  😞

I bought both of my soup makers in 2021, firstly a Morphy Richards in the UK just after Christmas then one in France a few months later, almost identical but quite a bit cheaper in a sale.  The French one has been used a lot over the years so I suppose for what it cost I've had my money's worth.

When we next go to the UK by car I will probably bring the Morphy Richards one back to France as it doesn't get used very often, only a handful of times per year.  In the meantime, I can use the broken French one on the "chunky" function, mainly used for soups like minestrone, which cooks the soup just the same but doesn't finish it off by blending.  On this occasion I just fished my stick blender out of the depths of the kitchen drawer and used that to finish the soup.  The deep shape of the machine made the blending very easy, probably easier than in a saucepan which would be wider, and much easier than transferring to a separate blender or food processor.  Just one extra piece of washing up, the stick blender wand, so it will do for now.

I notice that I can get a very similar new one for about 50€ on Amazon but would rather not spend the extra money as long as the heating element is still working and cooking the soup.

Update  I made a red pepper and tomato soup yesterday on chunky, got my stick blender ready, and thought I would try the "blender only" function on the soup maker, just in case.  It worked!  Maybe it just needed a rest!

Ingredients

4 small carrots

2 small potatoes

1 leek

a handful of radishes

1 large tomato

1 stick celery

1 chunk of cauliflower

3 broccoli stalks, woody outer layer removed

dry sherry and grated nutmeg (optional)

cream or crème fraîche for serving (optional)

Method

Wash, trim and roughly chop enough veg to fill the soup maker to the bottom line.

Add 1 vegetable stock pot and water to the top line.  Cook on smooth (or cook on chunky and finish with a stick blender).

Stir in a splash of dry sherry and a sprinkle of nutmeg before serving, and a swirl of cream in the bowl.

Makes 4 generous bowls of soup.

CARROT AND GINGER SOUP (soup maker recipe) with air fryer croutons

 

This recipe arises from the simple fact of having a surfeit of carrots.

Vegetables are not cheap in France, whether in supermarkets, greengrocers or the market.  Frequently they don't keep too long either.  So when a huge bag of nice looking carrots is on offer it's hard to resist them but important to use them up.  

Although the month of May is not far away it's still very much soup weather here in France and the warmth of ginger was a welcome addition on a particularly unpleasant day.

Ingredients *

2 smallish potatoes

6 medium carrots

1 large onion

1 stick celery

1 vegetable stock pot

2 cloves of garlic, peeled and grated

1 small knob of fresh ginger, about 2 cm square, peeled and grated

Method

Prepare the potatoes, onion and celery and put into the machine.  Then prepare enough carrots to fill the machine to the bottom line.  Add the ginger, garlic and stock pot.

Add enough water to fill to the top line (about 1 litre).

Cook on smooth.

For the croutons

5 slices medium sliced white bread

2 tblsp olive oil or a blend of olive and sunflower

1 tsp garlic granules

1 tsp dried mixed herbs (or other herbs of your choice)

1/2 tsp salt

Method

Stack the slices of bread on a chopping board and remove the crusts with a long sharp knife.  Slice down through the stack to cut into 1cm (approx) dice.

Tip the bread into a large bowl, add the other ingredients and stir well to make sure the bread is all coated.

Tip into the basket of your air fryer and cook at 180°C for 8-10 minutes until golden brown and crisp.  Shake the basket two or three times to ensure even cooking.

The croutons will keep and stay crisp for several days if stored in a well sealed jar, tin or box.  (Also good on salads.)

Makes 4 generous servings

*the recipe has been amended slightly to my current way of making it.

BROCCOLI, CAULIFLOWER AND BLUE CHEESE SOUP (soup maker recipe)

It's still very much soup weather here in France.  We seem to get one or two warm, sunny days, getting warmer week by week, followed by perishing cold grey, wet or drizzly days and very cold nights.  The 18°C sunshine  and clear blue sky the other day turned into a clear, starry night only a few degrees above freezing followed by a day of cold grey mizzle.  It's not time to put the soup maker to the back of the cupboard just yet and I regretted putting the electric blanket away already!

This soup was very much a "free soup" idea.  I always have to trim the leaves from a cauliflower to fit it into the fridge so had saved them and several stalks from some broccoli with the idea of turning them into soup.  My research told me it would produce a very delicate flavoured soup, which I interpreted as "not much flavour".  The usual way to add flavour to an otherwise bland soup is to add an extra stock pot or seasoning but I had decided on blue cheese, a popular flavour combo.

I discarded the floppy green bits from the cauliflower leaves and used mainly the thick white ribs.  I trimmed the ends and knobbly bits from the broccoli stems and removed the woody outer part.  I went a bit off piste and for once sautéed the leek.  

Into the cooked soup I stirred several dollops of whipped St Agur, a product I spotted here in France not long ago and it's delicious as a spread on toast or croutons.  I think that crumbling in any kind of blue cheese (to taste) would work just as well.  It added a lovely creaminess as well as the blue cheese flavour and the soup was divine.  Definitely a keeper!

Ingredients

cauliflower leaves

broccoli stems

1 leek

1 large potato, peeled and chopped

1 vegetable stock pot

creamed or whipped or crumbled blue cheese to taste

Method

Trim and wash the leek.  Slice into medium slices and fry gently in butter or oil until beginning to colour.

While the leek is cooking, discard any tired and floppy green parts of the cauliflower leaves.  Roughly chop the ribs and rinse well.

Trim the broccoli stems by removing the ends, the knobbly bits and the outer woody part.  Roughly chop and rinse well.

Add enough prepared veg to the soup maker machine to fill as far as the bottom line.  Add the stock pot and enough water to fill to the top line.

Cook on the smooth setting.

When cooked (or when reheating in a saucepan if serving later) stir in your blue cheese spread or other product to taste, until it melts and blends in.  A little can go a long way with some blue cheeses so go steady.  Season with salt and pepper to taste - remember that blue cheese can make it taste salty.

Serves 4 generous bowls of soup or 5-6 as a starter.

TOMATO AND RED PEPPER SOUP (soup maker recipe)

This recipe comes from an idea I spotted in a blog called "Liana's Kitchen".

I had a couple of red peppers in the fridge and roasting them with fresh tomatoes would have been a great idea.  However, I didn't have any fresh tomatoes and this was a lot quicker!  I used a tin of whole peeled tomatoes and added half a teaspoon of sweet smoked paprika which gave the soup an interesting smoky flavour.  

I had never tried using unsoaked red lentils in the soup maker before and my instincts told me it might lead to trouble (burnt bits in the machine and undercooked lentils) - but it worked!  It was a delicious soup, ready in less than thirty minutes from looking in the fridge to see what we could have for lunch today!  We ate it outdoors in the early spring/late winter sunshine - a rare treat with the very up and down weather we have had so far this year.

An interesting discovery is that the soup is also very good served cold, gazpacho style, in a small portion with a swirl of cream and a sprig of basil, as a starter.  Delicious.

On another occasion I used chunks of mixed red, green and yellow pepper from the freezer, thawed, and it was just as good.

Ingredients

100g red lentils, well rinsed

2 red peppers, washed, seeds removed and chopped

1 onion, peeled and chopped

1 clove of garlic, peeled and chopped 

1 tin whole peeled tomatoes including the juice

1 tsp sweet smoked paprika

1 garlic and thyme or vegetable stock pot

salt and pepper

Method

Put all the above ingredients into the soup maker.  Add enough water to fill to the top line and give it a good stir.

Cook on smooth setting.

Makes 4 generous portions (or six small bowls as a starter).

ANOTHER SUNDAY DINNER SOUP (soup maker recipe)

We are fans of leftovers in this house and there were quite a few after having friends round for Sunday lunch.  The menu was coronation chicken cocktail (a mini coronation chicken salad served as you would serve prawn cocktail), roast pork with home made sage and onion stuffing and apple sauce, cauliflower cheese, broccoli and mashed potatoes.

The table set for Sunday lunch for ten people.

You can see my earlier Sunday Dinner Soup here.  The principle is the same but this time there were enough leftover veg without adding anything else at all so no preparation of extra onion and carrot.  The quickest and easiest soup yet!

I had made the coronation chicken to an easy BBC Good Food recipe you can see here and I poached the chicken for it as per the recipe I used here.  I kept the liquid used for the poaching as stock, along with the bits of carrot and celery, with the possibility that there might be soup in mind.

Everything went into the soup maker and it was delicious, just like Sunday dinner in a bowl!  I added an extra spoonful of warmed apple sauce just before serving.  Yum!

Ingredients 

Two thin slices of roast pork, chopped

Cooked mashed potato and broccoli

A spoonful of cauliflower cheese

A small spoonful of stuffing (there was not much left)

The carrot and celery from poaching the chicken (or use a stick of celery and a carrot, chopped)

A spoonful of gravy

A blob of apple sauce

The poaching liquid from the chicken (or use a chicken stock pot or cube and water)

Method 

Add enough meat, cooked veg and stuffing to fill the machine to the bottom line.  Add the gravy, applesauce and enough of the poaching liquid (or the chicken stock pot/cube and water) to fill to the top line.  Stir well.

Cook on smooth.

Add a spoonful of warmed apple sauce before serving.

Makes 4 generous portions.

SOUP OF THE DAY (soup maker recipe)

I know I have waxed lyrical before about how useful I have found my soup maker but.........

Having made the Caesar salad for lunch one day I decided to use the veg and liquid from poaching the chicken the next day in a soup.  It worked really well using a random selection of other veg.  I poured the poaching mixture through a sieve into a jug first to pick out the veg then strained the liquid again to avoid using any unwanted bits in the soup.

My soup maker is a very basic design, doesn't have a sauté function, simply cooks either smooth or chunky but can be used as a blender only.  This is handy if I have made a chunky soup, such as minestrone, then decide I want the chunks a bit smaller.  A quick zap on the blender function makes it a bit finer.

My machine is essentially a large kettle with a blender in it.  Whilst I know that there are some soups that are better made using other means, for everyday lunches and most soups it works perfectly well.  There’s no simmering, stirring, or ladling into a blender to be done.  Once the veg are chopped and you switch it on it does all the work while you do something else and a perfectly good home made soup is ready less than thirty minutes later.  You can add a little spice, a few chopped herbs and a swirl of cream when served in the bowl or, my personal favourite from a Nigella Lawson recipe, a splash of dry sherry and some freshly grated nutmeg.  

There are numerous websites and cook books available to give you ideas, although many of them use machines with extra functions.  If a recipe needs fried or roasted ingredients I do that while chopping the rest of the veg.

One of the veg I like to use now is Jerusalem artichokes as a couple of these add a unique smokiness to the flavour of any soup.  I always buy a few when I see them as they also seem to keep quite well in the fridge.

For this soup I used

The veg and parsley from poaching the chicken (celery, carrot and garlic)

1 large carrot

1 largeish potato

1 medium onion

1 large leek

2 smallish Jerusalem artichokes

3 broccoli stalks, woody outer layer removed

1 chicken stock pot

Method

Having put the poaching veg into the soup maker add enough prepared other veg to fill to the bottom line.

Add the strained poaching liquid and enough water to fill to the top line.

Add the stock pot, give it a good stir and cook on smooth.

Makes 4 generous bowls of soup.

STUFFED MARROW SOUP (soup maker recipe)

I have made several soups in the soup maker using one leftover portion of casserole or similar and they have always turned out well.  This time, I looked at the one remaining portion of stuffed marrow (actually an overgrown courgette) and thought "why not".

I added a few extra bits and pieces (although I left out the small "courgette" as once I'd trimmed it I realised it was our last cucumber from the veg plot so added an extra potato instead!).

It made a really tasty soup, one of the best ever, and you can see the recipe for stuffed marrow (courgette) here.

Ingredients

1 portion of stuffed marrow, cut into chunks

3 small potatoes

2 medium carrots

1 onion

1 tomato

1 vegetable stock pot

Method

Peel, wash and roughly chop enough veg so that when the leftover meat dish is added last it will all fill the machine to the bottom line.  I have occasionally found that leftover meat dishes stick to the bottom of the machine and adding them last seems to prevent this from happening.  Top up with another chopped carrot or potato if there's room, or maybe some celery if you have some.

Add the stock pot and water to fill to the top line.  Cook on smooth.

Test for seasoning before serving as the leftover meat dish will already have been well seasoned.

Makes 4 generous portions.

BROCCOLI, CAULIFLOWER AND SPRING ONION SOUP (soup maker recipe)

Autumn is most definitely well established here in France and it's soup weather again.

Vegetables are not cheap here.  When we go back to the UK I am always amazed to find that you can still get a bag of parsnips or carrots for less than £1 or a cauliflower for less than £2.  In France we now use a lot of frozen veg; onions, mushrooms, leeks, cauliflower, broccoli, green beans.  It can be a cheaper way to buy them and helps to avoid waste.

Cauliflowers here can vary enormously in price from one week to the next.  They can be 1.90€ one week and 5.50€ the next in the same shop.  And often they are huge and already look past their best.  When they look nice and fresh and are a sensible price we buy them and they can be a challenge to use up before they go off.  With about one third of a cauliflower and a whole head of broccoli looking almost past it in the veg drawer I decided to make soup.

I have never found spring onions as we know them in the UK here; those slender, sweet and not at all sharp ones that are delicious in dips and salads.  Here I have found bunches of larger round white onions and much chunkier ones that look like British spring onions' big brothers and they are both stronger in flavour.  With half a bunch of those also needing to be used up I included them in this soup.

It was delicious!  Smoother than a home made soup often turns out which I wonder might be due to the variety of potato.  Who knows, but it's definitely a combination I will use again.

I made it ahead of using it and kept it in the fridge so when reheating it I added a good slurp of Pineau des Charentes (the nearest thing to dry sherry that you can readily buy here) and a swirl of cream when it was in the bowl.

Ingredients

4 small potatoes

2 medium carrots

a large chunk of cauliflower

a large chunk of broccoli, including (discarding the woody bits) the stalk

3 large "spring" onions, or a small bunch of small spring onions (or an ordinary white onion)

2 vegetable stock pots (I used the last of my Tesco garlic and thyme stockpots)

Salt and pepper to taste (or add this at the end of cooking or when reheating) 

A splash of dry sherry and a swirl of cream (optional) to add after cooking

Method

Peel, wash and roughly chop as appropriate enough veg to fill the soup maker to the bottom line.

Add the stock pots and water to fill to the top line.

Cook on smooth.

Makes 4 generous lunch servings, or 6 for first course servings.

SUNDAY DINNER SOUP (soup maker recipe)

We are very much fans of Sunday Dinner Pie in this house.  It's very similar to Christmas Dinner Pie which I wrote about here.

Last weekend we roasted a small joint of loin of pork in our usual way, which is in a covered roasting tin, sitting on a layer of sliced onions and covered with a herb crust (breadcrumbs with a few added mixed herbs).  We are not fans of pork crackling on account of it being "rather bad for you"!

Afterwards there were two small slices of pork, two potatoes and a few florets of broccoli and cauliflower left over, but no gravy.  Gravy is an essential element of Sunday Dinner Pie so I decided to turn the leftovers into soup instead.

It was delicious and quite thick because of the quantity of leftover potatoes but none the worse for that.  If I didn't own a soup maker I probably would have persevered with the pie option, making some extra gravy and using ready made pastry, or maybe turned it into some kind of gratin, or had a roast pork salad with the potatoes and discarded the rather tired looking veg.  Or, perish the thought, maybe even a roast pork sandwich and discarded everything else.  This was probably the easiest and quickest option that made use of all the leftovers.

It would probably work with any leftover roast meat.

Ingredients

2 slices of roast pork (with any attached herb crumb) chopped

1 onion (use the one that had been roasted with the meat if you have it)

leftover potatoes and veg

1 large carrot

1 small potato

1 leek

1 garlic and thyme stock pot (or a veg stock cube)

a splash of dry sherry (optional)

Method

Peel and roughly chop the carrot and put it in a layer in the bottom of the soup maker.  Put the Sunday dinner leftovers on top and then add enough prepared leek and potato to fill to the bottom line.

Add the stock pot or cube and enough water to fill to the top line.

Cook on smooth.  Stir the sherry into the finished soup.

Makes 4 generous servings.

COCK-A-LEEKIE SOUP

I made cock-a-leekie soup as the first course at our Burns Night Supper.  There were five guests plus ourselves so seven people in total.  This was more than my soup maker could handle so I made it like I always used to - in my large stock pot.  As the name suggests it is essentially a chunky chicken and leek soup!

Most of the recipes I consulted suggested cooking a chicken with the veg, taking the meat off the bones after it was cooked and adding it back into the soup.  I already had some home made chicken stock in the freezer so I cooked some chicken breasts separately (in the air fryer) and used those.  

Some recipes suggested adding prunes to the soup.  Prunes are a favourite in this house but not everyone is a fan so I left them out.  I would add some next time if I made a smaller quantity just for the two of us.  Another ingredient I left out was some smoked bacon because one of the guests eats only fish or chicken, no red meat. They would also be a good addition for next time I think!

It turned out really well - chunky veg, very tasty and this amount of ingredients made eight good servings.  It would also be an excellent way of using up leftover chicken.

Ingredients 

2 skinless chicken breasts, cooked 

A twinpack of smoked bacon lardons (optional)

4 large carrots

2 large leeks

4 sticks of celery 

50g butter

2 tblsp olive oil 

1 litre of chicken stock (home made or using water and two chicken stock pots or cubes)

1 bouquet garni

A good handful of stoned prunes (optional)

Method 

Peel and chop the carrots into small dice of about 1cm.  Trim and thinly slice the leeks.  Wash and thinly slice the celery.  

In a large saucepan or stock pot heat the oil and butter gently until the butter has melted, add the lardons if using, then add all the veg.  Cook gently until the veg are softened which will take about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally or shaking the pan so that they don’t stick.  

Add the stock and approximately a litre of water.  The liquid should cover the veg completely so use your judgment to add more water if needed.  Add the bouquet garni and season well with salt and pepper.

Bring to the boil and simmer gently for about 30 minutes.  If using the prunes add them half way through the cooking time.

Chop or tear the cooked chicken into small pieces and add into the pan.  Cook for another 5 minutes, check the seasoning and serve with a nice fresh baguette.

Makes 6-8 generous servings.

ROASTED TOMATO SOUP (soup maker recipe) and another note to self.

 

Having got my copy of "Masterchef Kitchen Bible" off the shelf to look for the tiramisu recipe, I flipped through the pages and turned up quite a few recipes that I wanted to try.  One of which was for this soup.  I adapted it for what I had in stock and for the soup maker.

Our tomato plants are still going strong and this recipe uses quite a few of them.

Essentially, you roast fresh tomatoes with onion and garlic and turn it into soup.  I had taken a few pictures of the tray of roasted tomatoes but when I came to review them I found that the SD card was not in the camera!  I had left it in the slot in the laptop and lost quite a few pictures as a result.  The camera does not have a hard memory of its own so they're gone for good.  Oh well, it will teach me to check before I use it next time!

This is an utterly delicious soup.  Like Heinz tomato soup but even better!  Not the quickest to make due to roasting the veg before putting them in the soup maker, but worth it.  (I put mine in the oven to roast while something else was cooking so it wasn't too much trouble.)  It would probably work just as well with shop bought tomatoes as roasting does bring out the flavour of most things that are a bit feeble in that department.  Using my home grown tomatoes I omitted the tomato paste but if using shop bought ones I would probably add it.

Note to self:  check for the SD card before next using the camera!

For Diane! A picture of my soup maker (next to the kettle).

Ingredients

6-8 large tomatoes, or a combination of any kind of tomato amounting to about 700g

1 large onion

2 cloves of garlic (unpeeled)

2-3 tblsp olive oil (or Fry Light)

home made vegetable or chicken stock plus one stock pot or cube (or use two stock pots or cubes)

3 small potatoes, peeled and quartered

1 medium carrot, peeled and sliced

2 tblsp tomato paste (optional)

Method

Preheat the oven to 180C / 160 fan / gas mk 4.

Cut the larger tomatoes into quarters, smaller ones in half and lay on a large baking tray.  Drizzle with the oil, season with salt and pepper and roast for 10 minutes.

Peel the onion and cut into quarters.  Add to the tomatoes with the unpeeled garlic and continue to roast for another 15 minutes.

Add the tomatoes, onion, carrot and potatoes to the soup maker,  Squeeze the garlic cloves out of their skins and add to the machine.  (Make sure not to go above the bottom line when adding the carrot and potatoes but use all of the tomatoes and onion.)

Add the stock and stock pot/cube plus enough water to fill to the top line.

Cook on smooth.

Makes 4 generous portions.

PEA AND MINT SOUP (soup maker recipe)

I have only had my Morphy Richards soup maker in the UK for a couple of years but it feels like for ever!  It’s become one of the most useful kitchen gadgets I have ever owned and I wouldn’t like to be without it.  In France I spotted a very similar model in a shop called Zodio and swooped when it was on offer for a bargain price of about £28.

The weather in our part of France has been odd so far this year.  Thankfully we haven’t yet had the heatwaves of the last couple of summers.  There have been a few days when the temperatures reached the low thirties but nothing like the high thirties and forty plus degrees that we endured last year. 

So much so that when friends came round for the evening recently, plans for chilled cucumber soup and a bbq were quickly shelved and I made this soup instead!  

Funnily enough, the friend who first recommended getting a soup maker told me this was her favourite soup to make in it but until now I never had.  So, with a bag of frozen peas in the freezer and a robust mint plant in the garden a rapid change of menu was easily achieved!

I found the recipe on the Morphy Richards blog which, at the time of writing, you can see here.  It has a few really nice, basic soup recipes which I shall no doubt work my way through - sooner rather than later if the weather continues to be a bit iffy this summer!

It was absolutely delicious! So easy to make that having a supply of frozen peas available has to be the easiest way to rustle up a super soup as a starter with the minimum effort ever!

Ingredients 

1 onion

700g frozen peas

2 cloves of garlic

1 medium potato 

2 vegetable stock cubes (I used one veg stock pot as that’s all I had)

A handful of fresh mint (or 1-2 tblsp dried mint)

700ml boiling water 

A squeeze of lime juice (optional - I omitted it as I didn’t have a handy lime in stock)

Salt and pepper to taste

Method 

Peel and chop the onion and garlic.  Peel and dice the potato.

Put everything into the soup maker machine and cook on the smooth setting.  Thin with a little boiling water if it’s too thick.  (You could also add a swirl of cream or crème fraîche for extra glamour before serving if you fancy!)

Makes 4 generous main course servings or 6 smaller portions as a starter.

ARTICHOKE SOUP (soup maker recipe)

I spotted this recipe on Phil's blog "As Strong as Soup" a good while ago where it is called Palestine soup.  Finding myself in front of a box of Jerusalem artichokes in SuperU recently, and with guests coming for dinner, I felt compelled to buy them and make it.  I don’t think I have ever seen them for sale in an English supermarket.  In France they are known as "topinambour".

They are peculiar looking things with a reddish brown knobbly skin (but then what vegetable doesn’t look peculiar if you are not familiar with it). They have a texture similar to a turnip and discolour rapidly once peeled so dropping them into water with a splash of lemon juice in it helps to stop that if necessary.  

Nick was very sceptical when I announced that I had bought some.  He has less than fond memories of some of the meals served up when he was a child.  He had an unhappy recollection of what his mother made with a box of Jerusalem artichokes that his father either won in a raffle or got for sixpence at an auction.  He is not sure which but it was not a popular vegetable with the family!

As Phil explains, the soup has nothing whatsoever to do with Palestine, a name given to it because of the belief that the artichokes come from Jerusalem, which they don't.  I read somewhere else that the misunderstanding arose because the plants look like sunflowers and the Italian word for sunflower is "girasole".  They taste nothing at all like artichokes either!

While in the supermarket I tried to recall Phil's recipe and forgot that it also included toasted hazelnuts.   Living out in the sticks in the middle of France, popping to the nearest shop that might or might not have any is a one hour round trip and in any case nuts are limited on my diet so I decided it would be ok to leave them out.

The next dilemma was whether or not to make it in the soup maker.  This machine has been my kitchen friend in my weight loss plan and I’ve had very few disappointments with it.  Some soups have turned out a bit thicker or thinner than expected and some a bit bland.  The texture can be adjusted by including more or fewer potatoes in the ingredients and the risk of blandness by using the right stock.  Jerusalem artichokes have a strong, distinctive flavour so I didn’t think there was any risk of this soup being bland.  The worry was that I had never used either milk or rice in the machine before.  However I was running out of time to look up whether or not they might not work so I decided to go for it and it worked fine.  

However I did find a small burnt patch in the bottom of the machine when I washed it out.  This has happened very occasionally with other soups and is easily remedied by putting a dishwasher tablet or powder in the machine with a small quantity of water and leaving it to stand until the tablet dissolves.  The burn mark then wipes away effortlessly leaving a pristine shiny machine.  

The soup was delicious.  A glorious colour, just the right thickness and a hit with everyone, including Nick.  I had adapted Phil's recipe for the soup maker but you can see his original post here.

Ingredients

1 onion

2 medium carrots

450g Jerusalem artichokes

1 medium potato

150ml milk

1 heaped tablespoon of basmati or long grain rice, rinsed well

300ml vegetable stock, home made or from a stock pot or cube

Method

Peel and prepare the veg as usual and add to the machine.

Add the rice, milk, stock, salt and pepper and enough water to fill to the top line.  Give it all a good stir (this may prevent the burning).  White pepper (canteen pepper) is recommended so that the soup retains its beautiful colour.

Cook on smooth.  Check and adjust the seasoning to taste before serving.

Makes 4 generous portions.