My eldest brother emailed us all at 3am this morning to tell he had tried standing outside in minus 10.1C without a coat. my mother responded by sending this recipe for French Peasant Soup. I had already begun making Tana Ramsey’s Beetroot Soup so I’ll do this during the week. I substituted potato for the celery in the beetroot soup and it was even nommier. I use prepack beetroot rather than fresh. Delish and an amazing colour!
Here’s Mum’s recipe. Enjoy!
French Peasant Soup
Serves 6
170g unsmoked steaky bacon in one piece (optional – I use a few rashers cut up)
55g onions chopped
140 g potatoes peeled and cut into dice
55g Savoy cabbage finely chopped (optional)
450g ripe tomatoes or 1 x 400g tin of tomatoes and their juice
11/4 pints (3 cups) chicken stock
1 small clove garlic
salt and pepper
½ teaspoon sugar
olive or sunflower oil
parsley to garnish
If you use the bacon cut it into pieces and fry it in the oil. Add potatoes onions and the crushed garlic sweat for 10 minutes and then add tomatoes and any juice.
Season with salt, pepper and sugar and cover with stock and cook for 5 minutes. Add the finely chopped cabbage and continue to simmer until cabbage is cooked. Taste and adjust seasoning and sprinkle with chopped parsley and serve
That sounds yummy, I love bacon in anything. Tell me, did brother #1 survive his Arctic jaunt?
I think he probably did. Brother no. 2 got back to us and made some soup with seaweed in it because he didn’t know the french for the kinda cabbage Mum was on about above. However I pointed out that Mum has NEVER put in cabbage so you can try it without. Also it is of course even better on day 2.