What About a Bowl of Soup?

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 23055, 4 June 1938, Page 7 (Supplement)

What About a Bowl of Soup?

Nourishing and Tempting Varieties 'J'HERE are many occasions when a bowl of thick soup is all you need for a meal. It makes a quick luncheon or a light supper, is just the thing for tho children when they come in cold and wet from school, and makes a pleasant snack after a late session at the cinema or a dance. A Winter Puree Four large potatoes, 1 or 2 onions, 2 sticks celery (or a turnip), 3 pints water or stock, 1 pint milk, 1 tablespoon butter or very good dripping, salt and pepper to taste, a tiny pinch of sugar, and a little bunch of herbs tied in a muslin bag, 1 tablespoon flour. Peel tho vegetables and cut them roughly. Cook all together with the butter in the saucepan, but without browning, as this is to be a "white" puree. Then add the water (or stock) and all the seasonings, and boil gently for about 1$ hours, or until the vegetables are tender. Many people like a bacon bono boiled with this soup. Then place a wire sieve (there are small wire ones to be had nowadays) in a big bowl, and turn the whole saucepanful into it. Use a wooden spoon vigorously, mashing the vegetables through until there is practically nothing left in the colander—except perhaps a celery "string" or two in tjiis case. Vegetable Soup Here is a nourishing soup whicV can be made when there is no stock available. Cut into small dice two large onions, a carrot, a turnip, and two leeks. Melt a lump of butter in a saucepan and put in the vegetables. Fry for a few minutes until the onion

begins to brown, add a quart of water, and bring to the boil. Skim until clear, then cover and simmer gently for about an hour, until the vegetablea are soft. Season well with celery salt, salt, cayenne, and mace, and add a pint of hot milk and a handful of rice or soaked barley. Boil until the rice or barley is cooked, then serve very hot. Etceteras Add Interest If you have thick cream soup you can add nourishment and interest by putting in croutons of fried bread. The Dutch add chopped breakfast sausage to pea soup, and in Spain they make it up like force-meat balls, fry them in butter and add them to the soup. The German marrow dumplings add a substantial note to a soup meal, and ordinary little suet dumplings will be particularly appreciated by the children with meat or pea soup. Kidney Soup Take 41b. each of ox kidney and stewing beef, parboil, cut into pieces and fry lightly in dripping with a tablespoon of chopped onion and a teaspoon of chopped parsley. Put in a pan with a pint and a-half of stock, sfeason, bring to the boil and simmer for two hours. Take out the meat, rub through a wire sieve, return to the seup, thicken with a tablespoon of flour and boil for 15 minutes longer, stirring all tho time. Mutton Broth This is delicious if properly made. Cut 21b. of neck of mutton into pieces, cover with three pints of water, and simmer for three hours with herbs, two large turnips, a large onion, and 4 carrots. Then take out the meat, take it from the bones, and reheat with the chopped vegetables, 2 tablespoons parboiled pearl barley, and good seasonings. Add more vegetables if liked and stew for 45 minutes more. Green Pea Soup Two large cups dried green peas, 1 or 2 onions, 1 carrot, 1 turnip, 1 stick celery, a handful of chopped green celery leaves, 2 quarts water or stock, 2 or 3 sprigs mint, bacon bones or any fresh soup bones available, salt and pepper to taste, J-teaspoon sugar, and 1 teaspoon flour if needed. Soak the • peas overnight, using a pinch of baking soda if they are very hard. Next day pour off the water, and put the peas into tho saucepan with

tho grated or chopped fresh vegetables, and all the other ingredients, except the flour. Boil gently until the peas are soft ; thicken if liked, and servo very hot —with dumplings on a cold day I Lentil Soup When peas become monotonous as winter fare, there are still lentils, thoso very cheap and small pulses that look liko reddish-brown split peas. Use them exactly as you would split peas, and with a good variety of soup vegetables, and serve tho soup just as it is, or as a puree. Dried haricot or lima beans (soaked overnight) can also be used in the same way to give a nourishing soup of entirely different flavour. Both are inexpensive. The Art of Flavouring If you live where there are no fresh herbs, remember that a teaspoon of the dried variety (in muslin) is a great help in flavouring a soup. If there is no celery remember that dried celery seed is obtainable from the grocer, and that a teaspoonful, again tied in muslin gives the celery flavour, besides helping your rheumatism. You can also achieve variety with an occasional dash of spice or with bacon bones instead of fresh bones.