Soup methodology.

[ChaosTrulyReigns]

Right, I'm outing myself as a soup numpty!

I think I'm an adequate-ish cook, but I've never been able to make a good soup.

Please can I have some tips for making great vegetable soup?

For both starting from scratch and also using leftover vegetables?

I use leftover cooked veggies if I have them. If you got leftover baked potatoes you can mash them up and add them; I've found it adds some creaminess. A lot of times I puree half of the soup and then mix it back it; we like the texture of it. I had a hard time with soup at first too, but if you keep messing with it and trying new things you'll get it right. :)

Top Tip!

Don't use orange and green veg in the same recipe, unless spinach at v end, as it will go brown and look yukky!

Yes good tip! I also find broccoli a tricky one to add to a soup, it seems to overpower things unless it's the main ingredient.

I always add a tin of chopped toms to veg soup at the stock stage and also add a good shake of curry powder when sweating off the onions to give the soup some oomph.

Easy peasy-leek and potato. chop quite finely lots of leeks and wash. Melt butter (use proper butter) sweat leeks. peel and dice potatoes (they should not be so small to disintegrate or bigger than can fit on your soup spoon) Throw potatoes into leeks stir about in the butter than add chicken stock till its as thick or thin as you want. cook till spuds are done if they break down completely it dosent matter.
French onion soup
Cot onions in half, remove root and finely slice long ways,do as many as you can. Use a heavy pan heat a little olive oil add onions cover and cook gently over a low heat for ages and ages until they are softly brown and sweet. Cover with red wine and simmer then top up with beef stock to whatever thckness you like. If you can, top with french breafd and cheese and grill in individual bowls till bubbly. I dont have a grill so i make little cheesy toasts and float them on top
YUM

If you have roasted a chicken and the oven is still hot, and if you have a crusuet(dont know how to spell that!) heavy oven proof pan. Put in it carcass and stock ingredients carrots onion etc and garlic and make stock in the oven, its browner and tastier

I just tried making a sweet potatoe soup that turned out really well and was super easy.

All you need to do is brown an onion in a big pot, add about 4 or 5 sweet potatoes, a good pinch of salt and a tsp or two of good paprika (I used hot) and then covered with chicken stock and let it simmer for about 20 minutes.

I find the key to a good soup is:
1: good stock
2: Use a blender rather than a food processor or hand mixer. It just comes so lovely and velvety.

I second Littlefish's courgette soup. This was my secret recipe for years - it tastes far more complicated and luxurious than the few ingredients suggest. (Make sure you add enough salt & pepper though.)

good veg soup:

3 carrots
2 potatoes
1 leek
2 onions
1 or 2 finger chilies (optional)

chop it all up,add veg stock plus one chicken stock, boil until everything softens and use hand blender to blend :)

yum! and easy :)

I find if you roast the veg first (its actually just as easy) it somehow adds flavour. I have no vegetable discrimination and will roast anything at all I can find, then add stock and blend. Also if you make something that tastes slightly odd, add pesto. Works every time.

I love thick veg soup in winter and find that throwing everything in the pressure cooker and then in the blender works pretty well - current favourite is parsnip with a chilli, cumin and coriander kick.

I think using a nice quality stock makes a big difference too - I always put leftover sauce from casseroles etc in the freeer so they can just be thrown in. And chicken noodle soup made from the carcass of a roast is one of my favourites

I'm a TA in Year 4 and last term our cooking slot was soup. I had to do it 8 times with various children, and did Winter Vegetable every time...and every time, without fail, it was the one that the children voted as their favourite! I must confess I also make it regularly at home now; it's SO delicious, and dead easy, and I'm a rubbish cook!

The ingredients:

2 carrots
1 large parsnip
1 onion
3 small/med potatoes
1 stick of celery
1 leek

Basically chop the veg up nice and small, bung them all in a pan with 2 tbsp olive oil and let them fry gently, covered, for about 15 mins (stirring to avoid sticking). Then add 1/4 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp black pepper, 2 tbsp tomato puree, a bay leaf and 2 pints of veg stock (we used 2 x Knorr stock cubes, but I've also used OXO and even Tesco Value ones with equal success).

Bubble for about 20-25 mins then remove the bay leaf and blend. It's lovely!!! 120 x 8-9 year olds can't be wrong, surely

My latest success is parsnip and celery, but agree the key is a good stock. I use my own chicken stock, but that would not be suitable for veggies obviously!

1 bunch of celery, 1 large onion, 2 parsnips. All chopped as small as you can be bothered, then sweated for ages and gently in olive oil. Once they are all soft and squishy, add a knob of butter and a tablespoon or two of flour (butter needs to be soaked up by flour till flour is yellowy/ brown colour.) Then add stock bit by bit whilst stirring into a paste, then keep adding liquid until you are happy with liquidity!

Then chuck it all into a blender and blend to your chosen consistency. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Have served this about 5 times in the last couple of weeks and everyone was impressed.

I love using Jerusalem artichokes - they're in season right now and together with butter nut squash make a glorious winter soup.
It is delicous , but they don't call it FFF'artichoke soup for nothing !

Lots of good recipes here I'll be noting them down.

Best way of using up leftover veggies for me is to mix them in with mash (which could also be a leftover) and fry them as potato cakes. DS will always eat these so it's actually a good way to sneakily get veg into him

you need stock, veg and a thickener

i use oxo cubes, whatever veg I have but make sure there's an onion and celery in there, add your leftovers and I also sweat a potato too for thickness and creaminess and add that.

i agree with no carrots in a green veg soup btw....looks horrid!

If it doesn't taste of much add chilli powder.

experiment with herbs too

I don't know if anyone's said this, but always use a blender, not a food processor. The latter gives a weird texture ime.
I've got tons of great soup recipes but also like making soup from leftovers. A former colleague of mine said she always had some home-made soup in the fridge because she made soup out of leftovers practically every day. It works particularly well with casserole-type things - just add stock and whizz.
After she said that, I made one from a leftover home made chicken curry. Dh said it was the best soup he'd ever had! I don't get around to making soup as often as I'd like though.

do you have to peel the butternut squash?

Ninunina and GoldBerry Don't food processors come with blender attachments?