Tag: Summer Soup

Fresh Pea Summer Soup

  • Dried peas were part of a staple diet in the Middle Ages in Europe.
  • Eating fresh and immature green peas was a more modern delicacy.
  • This soup could have only been made summer and the peas would have had to be shelled.
  • The invention of fast freezing by Clarence Birdseye, an American, in the 1920s revolutionised the way we eat foods out of season, most notably green peas.
  • In the past the vegetables would have had to be pressed several times through clothes or sieves – nowadays we have stick blenders and similar electrical cooking tools to make this easier.

Ingredients

  • 100 -150g shelled or frozen peas
  • 1 bunch of spring onions
  • ½ a large lettuce
  • 50g butter
  • 1-2 lovage or celery leaves
  • 1½ litres of vegetable stock – can be from a cube or powder
  • 125ml of soured cream
  • Chopped chives or flat-leafed parsley to garnish

Method

  • Chop white and green parts of the spring onions in small rings.
  • Gently fry in butter to soften but not to brown them.
  • Cut the lettuce into thin strands.
  • Add the lettuce and the peas to the spring onions and mix.
  • Add the lovage or celery leaves and the stock.
  • Bring to the boil and then simmer gently for up to 10 minutes until the peas are cooked.
  • Take off the heat and leave to cool a little (for safety).
  • Blend the soup until you have a thick purée.
  • Adjust the seasoning if necessary.
  • Bring back to the boil.
  • Stir in the soured cream and serve.
  • Add a dollop of soured cream to each serving.
  • Garnish each dish with chopped chives, flat-leafed parsley to garnish.

 

Served in Royal Doulton – Carnation – 1982 -1998

Green Early Summer Soup

In olden days, and even in Communist times in Poland, the only vegetables available in winter were root vegetables or preserved or bottled ones.

When sorrel leaves started to grow this marked the end of winter – a herald of spring and the start of fresh greens.

I grow sorrel in pots in my garden.

I posted a recipe for Polish sorrel soup nearly a year ago.  The following recipe does not require as much sorrel, though should you not have any sorrel at all, then use more spinach and another lemon.

Ingredients

  • 100g sorrel leaves
  • 100g of fresh spinach leaves (or use frozen)
  • ½ a head of a large lettuce
  • Juice of 1 lemon
  • 125ml soured cream
  • 2 egg yolks
  • Salt & Pepper if needed
  • *
  • Chopped hard boiled eggs – around 1 egg  per serving.

Method

  • Have the vegetable stock ready and hot in a saucepan.
  • Remove any thick stalks from the sorrel and spinach.
  • Chop the lettuce, sorrel and spinach.
  • Add them to the stock.
  • Bring to the boil and then simmer gently for around 5 minutes.
  • Take off the heat and leave to cool a little (for safety).
  • Blend the soup until you have a thick purée.
  • Adjust the seasoning if necessary.
  • Bring back to the boil.
  • In a small dish mix the soured cream with the egg yolks.
  • Take the pan off the boil and add the lemon juice
  • Stir in the soured cream mixture and then use a balloon whisk to mix it in.
  • Adjust the seasoning if needed.
  • *
  • Serve with chopped hard boiled eggs.

 

Soup plate – Royal Doulton – Burgundy – 1959-1981

Early Summer Soup

In the original recipe this was called spring soup.  I thought it a bit strange as not all the ingredients are out in spring – so I have re-named it to early summer soup.

Otherwise you could call it green leaves soup!

It is a really super soup – very tangy  with the sourness loved by Poles.

If you have the vegetable stock and some hard boiled eggs ready – then this is a very quick soup to make.

Some of the ingredients – growing in pots in my garden

It is hard to give exact amounts needed – around 500ml in volume of different leaves.

Ingredients

  • Large handfuls of sorrel
  • Large handfuls of spinach – or use frozen leaf spinach
  • Several sprigs of flat-leaved parsley
  • A stem of lovage or some celery leaves
  • 1 litre of vegetable stock – can be from a cube or concentrate.
  • 1 tablespoon of plain flour
  • 2 tablespoon of milk
  • 250ml soured cream
  • *
  • Hard boiled eggs – 1 per serving

Method

  • Have the vegetable stock ready and hot in a saucepan.
  • Remove all the leaves from the stalks.
  • Chop the leaves.
  • Add the leaves to the stock.
  • Mix the flour with the milk.
  • Add the flour mixture to the soup.
  • Mix well and simmer for 3 minutes.
  • Take the pan off the boil and stir in the soured cream.
  • Serve with a hard boiled egg chopped in half per serving.

Served in Royal Doulton – Carnation  1982- 1998