Soup weather! YAY! I just love soup!
Throw a whole lot of stuff in a pot, simmer, bang it in the blender, and wha-lah: meal in a bowl! Now that's my kind of meal. Easy, versatile, and healthy too!
I have made a few batches lately. I just love the ability of soup to take some boring old leftovers that I really don't feel inspired to eat, and turn it into something delicious, nutritious, and oh so satisfying for my 'waste-not' soul. Leftovers suddenly become inspiration. A recent soup started off with some leftover sauce from the previous night's dinner. The interesting thing is that the sauce wouldn't probably be your first thought for a soup base. It was juiced apple with cooked onion slices that had been used to cook some pork chops. Add a whole bunch of veges, a tin of baked beans, and it was just delicious!
Today's soup was inspired by a roasted pumpkin that needed to be used but didn't look quite good enough to make pumpkin soup. I teamed this one up with some leftover casserole sauce (the beef casseroles started to overflow their dishes and create havoc in my oven a few nights ago so I scooped the tomato based sauce into a pot and shoved it in the fridge till I could decide what to do with it all!). I added kumara, potato, carrot, and onion. Then a tin of borlotti beans, 1/4 of a cup each of red split lentils and pearl barley, and some silverbeet, thyme and parsley from the garden. A dash of sweet chilli sauce and some salt, an hour's cooking, a blend and we have just eaten yet another delicious soup!
I quite like blending vege soups like these. I find I can put a larger proportion of energy dense foods like beans, lentils and pearl barley, without feeling like I'm just eating beans and beans and beans (not really a fan of beans!). We get a really filling soup that is both good for us and tasty enough that we actually want to eat bowlfulls of it. Even Boyo (not a soup fan) will have soup and bread for dinner...especially if bribed with the promise of apple crumble for dessert!
Do you have a favourite soup, or favourite way of making it?
Amy
Wednesday, 27th April, 2011
YUMMY - cooking a stew as I type this, dinner tonight :-)! Luke loves soups and stews thankfully!!!!
ReplyDeleteTonight's dinner ... soup with a grilled cheese roll followed by left over strawberry and apple crumble with custard! One of my favourite winter meals.
ReplyDeleteI love soup too, but DH does not necessarily so, so the soup pot does not get used quite as much as it once did.... :-(
ReplyDeleteBlessings
M