Bottom of the fridge soup

So being as its Monday, two days to dole day, and I've just done up my Xmas budget, things are looking pretty tight. One of the ways I try to save money is by making soup and having it regularly for lunch. You can do up a batch of pretty tasty home made soup and get 4 to 5 lunches out of it. I'd be able to do more in one go if a) I had a bigger saucepan and b) I had a bigger fridge and more than a nasty little envelope sized freezer. I live in shared flat so theres not much space for storing extra food in the fridge, so I can't cook too much at once.

Anyway, following a review of my fridge, the following veg was on hand:

So basically, half a leftover onion, a leek, 1 potato, 1 carrot (organic, I only buy organic carrots as I find the standard ones really tasteless),some garlic and some mushrooms. Not too shabby! So here's a recipe for basic soup. You can make soup out of any veg just follow a few general principles:

2 days to pay day Veg Soup

Ingredients:

1 onion (pretty essential) finely chopped

2 cloves of garlic, peeled and finely chopped

assortment of veg, washed, peeled and finely chopped

a knob of butter, and a drop of oil

1 stock cube, preferably a decent one

1 heaped tsp of dried dill

salt & freshly ground pepper

Method:

In a large saucepan, add your butter and a drop of oil (to stop burning) on a medium heat. When the butter is melted add the onion and sautee for a good 5 minutes to release the flavour of the onions. If you're cooking vegetarian food, you need to get as much flavour from the onion as possible (as you are lacking the incredible flavour boost of meat) so cook it for a while, but take care not to burn it. I always use butter for soup, as its only a tiny amount and adds a lovely flavour beyond what oil alone can do.

Add your veg, starting with the hardest first, sautée it for a few minutes so it gets its buttery coating, and then add the next vegetable. So in this case I cooked the carrot & potato first, then the leek and mushrooms. Lastly, add the garlic and fry for another minute.

Make up your stock with boiling water and add to the pan so that the water level is just above the line of the veg in the pot. I like Kallo or Just Boullin stock cubes, available in Dunnes & health food shops. They're about €1.99 a pack. I generally use chicken stock for veg soup as it gives a nice extra dimension of flavour but obviously if you are making soup for a vegetarian, just use vegetable stock.

Bring to the boil, reduce heat, add dill* & simmer for 30 minutes or until veg is tender. Season with salt & pepper. When the soup has cooled a little use a hand blender to liquidise it and you're ready to go. Pretty tasty and very cheap.

This is the most basic soup recipe, but I've been trying out different types and I'll post more on soups soon!

* I find dill tastes delicious as a seasoning for soups. It's also a very useful herb for fish, and can be used in all manner of dishes and sauces for fish. Its one of those herbs that is delicious fresh, but also not too bad dried. Thyme and Rosemary are great dried too, whereas Parsley is just completely pointless and flavourless when dried.