Celery and potato soup

I knew I felt like soup for lunch. The days are getting pretty cool in the south east of South Australia. It's feeling very much like comfort food weather, soup weather. 

I'd ducked into the supermarket, there greeting me as I walked in, were bunches of celery for one whole dollar. Yes please! 

I came home and made soup for lunch, and it was choice!

The leftover celery I wrapped in alfoil, and kept in the fridge. I saw this tip on Facebook a while ago, and it really works. The celery stays crisp for a couple of weeks. 

It's probably one of the top veggies that gets chucked out, because it never gets used up before it goes all limp and boring.

You can slice it up and freeze it for later use, in casseroles and soups. Better than chucking money away.

When I was a kid, I loved it spread with peanut butter. I can't bring my kids to love it though, they've never been big lovers of peanut butter. Celery they do love to crunch on though. At least it is one veggie I know Izzy will eat. Fresh anyway, she is not a cooked veggie lover. She'll only eat cooked corn cobs, that's it. It's a good thing she likes her veggies raw and crunchy, as I'd never get her to eat them. She would never go for this soup.  

So. I had two bowls for lunch.....

Celery and potato soup

1 tablespoon of butter
1 onion, sliced
1 large potato, or 2 small ones
5 big stalks of celery
700 mls water or veggie stock
1/2 cup milk
salt and pepper

Place the butter in a large saucepan over a medium heat. Cook the onion, potato and celery for 5 minutes.

Add the water/stock and simmer for 20 minutes. 

Puree the soup in a blender or with a stick blender. 

Put the saucepan of soup back on the heat, add the milk. Stir to warm through the milk. Season with salt and pepper. 

Serving suggestions 

• Serve with crispy bacon or pancetta
• A sprinkle of paprika and blue cheese(pictured)
• crusty bread
• drizzled with chilli oil

Do you love your veggies fresh and crunchy, or cooked? 
Did you ever have celery with peanut butter?

An InLinkz Link-up

Beetroot relish

I am a total sucker for those marked down bags of produce at the supermarket. A bag of beets for $3? No, nothing absolutely crazy about that! I'll take one! 

I love trying out something new. A cooking challenge. A new taste sensation.

You came to the right place if you want too much information, I peed red for a day after scoffing the beets I roasted. Bloody delicious! Chop into chunks(about 3cm), smother in oil, salt and pepper and roast(190C) for about 20 minutes. Yu-umee!

I also made this relish. Great on burgers, and great as a side at your next barbie. Barbecue weather is beating on the door. Can't wait.

Beetroot Relish

4 cups of grated beetroot(about 5-6 beets)
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup balsamic vinegar
2 teaspoons salt

Add grated beetroot, sugar and vinegar into a saucepan.
Stir over medium heat until the sugar dissolves and mix comes to the boil.
Simmer for 25 minutes or until the liquid has evaporated.
Stir through salt and spoon into clean hot jars, that have been sterilised in the oven at 190C for 15 minutes.

Do you love beets? 

What's your 'must have' on the menu, when you BBQ?

I have an awesome burger recipe tomorrow, you should check it out. So tasty. Perfect for the barbie, a hamburger or just rissoles for dinner. 

An InLinkz Link-up

Veggie patch envy

There may have been some confusion yesterday when I posted pictures of that beautiful veggie patch. I had a feeling that some may have thought it was ours, but alas, I too have garden envy.

That veggie patch is out on my brother in laws farm, he and his wife have gone travelling around Australia for most of this year. Their daughter(my niece) and her fiance are living there at the moment, we were feeding the chooks, the dog and her cat while they too had gone away for several days.

We were merely raiding the veggie patch ;)

These are pictures of my veggie patch, not so overflowing. The two barrels used to have shrubs in them. They were looking rather ragged and sad, so I ripped them out, added some sheep poo compost and put in veggie seed. One has wombok and broccoli in it and the other, carrot and lettuce. They seem to be going alright, green fingers crossed.

My neglected patch has, at the moment, some broad beans growing, not badly and some shallot type onion things. Some lovage(great to use as a celery substitute), perpetual leeks and parsley. This patch needs the sheep poo treatment too, the gum trees don't help. My bad for putting veggies there in the first place.

I've planted the square pot on the veggie patch retaining wall with a peruvian purple potato, it looks to be growing ok, hopefully, whenever they are ready, the pot is full of them when I tip it out.

How do you like our scarecrow? This was Boggys fancy dress costume for the recent 40th we went to, determined not to let it go to waste, this was my solution. Dunno how thats gonna work out, because it is sure to perish out there!