Actually I call this my frugal soup. It technically isn’t free as somewhere along the line the stuff I use in my frugal soup was purchased.
However nothing was bought specifically for this meal. All of it is from the fridge, the garden or leftovers.
Really you can put anything you like in frugal soup – but you might like to think about what flavours naturally go together. Tonight I cooked off some leftover yellow and red onion with some garlic and a little butter. Then added a whole lot of tomatoes chopped up fresh from the garden – skin, seeds and all. Cook this till soft.
After that I threw in whatever I could find in the fridge which happened to be – some steamed broccoli and cauliflower and a little left over bolgnese sauce.
Something else I had on hand saved from when I cook chicken or beef in the oven is the stock pan juices. These are always saved, the fat scraped off and frozen. I added in about 3 cups of this. Mixed chicken and beef tonight.
Then last I tossed in a whole bunch of rocket which we have in abundance at the moment. Bring this all to the boil and simmer till all the vegetables are soft.
Every kitchen needs one of these. A Bamix. If you have ever used a blender and hated the mess and cleaning up involved, plus the difficulties of using them with hot steamy food then you will definitely want one of these. This Bamix is only the second one I have had in 23 years and is used at least 4 or more times a week.
It really is one of my favourite gadgets for the kitchen.
If you have nothing else then this would be the must have!
You can use it right in your saucepan to liquidize or blend your soup (or anything “lumpy” for that matter) to whatever level of smoothness you like.
As you can see my soup is pretty thick. We like it that way – although you could add some extra stock or water and make it thinner if you prefer.
Serve with some savoury scones (Amercian biscuits), a dash of fresh cream, creme fraiche or sour cream.
Not bad for free!
An Altered Life 