Roasted purple carrot and sage soup, and earth-mothering

I am doing my own brand of earth-mothering right now. I can't quite bring myself to use cloth nappies, but I am washing my bubba in camomile water and using the most eco friendly, natural products possible. I'm probably not going to do prolonged breastfeeding, yet I am still doing it at 5 months and will try to keep going for the rest of the year (though that's not to say formula won't get introduced at some point too). I guess I am trying to be as much of an earth-mother as I can without making my life too inconvenient. I think that's a fair compromise. I do dream of living somewhere more green and growing my own organic fruit and vegetables, but for now this is just a dream while we survive our first year in busy Hackney. Luckily, we do have some (over-priced) organic shops here now. This is where I found my purple carrots for this earthy soup.

Roast the purple carrots with a handful of sage leaves, some rapeseed oil and Maldon sea salt on 200 degrees C for about 20min. Reserve a few crispy sage leaves for decoration and blend everything else with some good quality stock (I used chicken stock). Return to the pan and season with more sea salt, white pepper and mustard powder. Serve with a dollop of soured cream, some alfafa sprouts and those crispy sage leaves you put aside.

Ingredients (serves 2)

6 purple carrots

500ml chicken or vegetable stock 

Handful sage leaves

Rapeseed oil for roasting

1 teaspoon mustard powder

Sea salt and white pepper

Soured cream to serve

Alfafa sprouts to serve

Simple spinach soup

I always say that in food, as in life, simplicity is a virtue. Simple days, simple pleasures are the best. A baby's laugh, the sun coming out from behind a cloud, a flower in bloom, these are beautiful things we do not need to fight or struggle for, simply appreciate. A daily practise of gratitude (in whatever form) can make you more aware of wonderful, everyday pleasures. Something simple to eat does not mean grabbing a packet of crisps though. A simple soup takes little more effort and is infinitely warmer, more nurturing...

Whenever I roast a chicken I use the bones and leftovers to make a broth. I stick whatever I have lying around in there. This time it was an onion, a carrot and a chilli pepper. After about 3 hours of boiling these together with the chicken carcass and a sprinkle of Malden sea salt, I strained the liquid and distributed it among various vessels: some for immediate use, some for the fridge, some for the freezer. You could, of course, replace the chicken broth with a good quality chicken stock. To make this particular soup, I fried some garlic along with the spinach and (once cool) I blended it with the chicken broth. To thicken I added a tablespoon of rye flour and some ground flaxseeds. I brought this back to the boil, seasoned with salt and white pepper and served with spinach trottole and crumbled feta cheese for a healthy, filling and delicious dinner.

Ingredients 

500ml chicken broth (chicken carcass, onion, carrot, chilli pepper)

250g spinach

3 garlic cloves, chopped
1 tablespoon rye flour
1 tablespoon ground flaxseeds

50g cooked trottole pasta per serving 

50g feta per serving 

Super healthy Polish sauerkraut soup

Sauerkraut doesn't sound terribly sexy I know. Yet it's one of the healthiest things you can eat due to its vitamin C, mineral and probiotic content. The juice from the cabbage is a brilliant hangover remedy, my dad assures me, although I haven't tried it myself. I do, however, crave this wintery soup from time to time.

I have limited the amount of pork that goes in to just some good quality lardons (from Ginger Pig of course) and used a beef rib for the stock. Since I've been working on the book I have realized how vague my recipes can be. It's because I see cooking as something that's adaptable and not an exact art, yet I can see that being vague often confuses perfectly simple matters, therefore it's something I've been working on and I hope my recipes now reflect this.

Recipe

2 litres water

500g sauerkraut

1 beef rib

150g lardons

2 potatoes, peeled and chopped

1 carrot

1 parsnip

1 onion, peeled and charred over stove

1 celery stick with leaves

2 bay leaves

5 allspice berries

5 whole peppercorns

1 teaspoon cumin

White and black pepper

Cook the rib with the carrot, parsnip, celery and onion with the bay leaves, allspice and peppercorns in the water for at least 1 hour, preferably 1.5 hours.

Remove the vegetables and beef, add the potatoes and sauerkraut. Add the cumin. Cook for a further 30min.

Meanwhile, fry the lardons on a frying pan until slightly crispy. Add these to the soup for the final 10min.

Season with black and white pepper. The soup doesn't need salt as the sauerkraut is already salty.

Chicken and vegetable soup with gherkin "croutons"

My vegetarianism lasted about 6 weeks. It wasn't the taste of meat that knocked me off the wagon, it was something much bigger and more exciting - my book-to-be. There is a very good chance that I may get it published soon. The point being that this book would not survive my vegetarianism. I had to make a choice so I made it: vegetarianism can wait. Something that I haven't given up on is my monthly focus. March will be all about... decluttering. My home and my mind, one step at a time. Every day I declutter a tiny area of my flat - a shelf, a box, a draw... And how do I declutter my mind? Every morning I meditate and set my intention for the day. That's all. Simple, like all the best things in life. And talking of simple...since I'm eating meat again I made this chicken and vegetable soup last night. We'd spent the whole day cooking for the homeless and needed something nourishing.

 I used 3 chicken drumsticks as well as leek, celery and carrots to make a stock. Then I added the pearl barley, cabbage and potatoes. You need to allow this to simmer until everything is soft now - about 40min - before frying the cubes of gherkin on a separate pan until golden. While they're frying, season the soup with salt and black and white pepper until it tastes right to you. You may a tablespoon or two of brine from the gherkins too at this point. Turn the heat off. Pour the double cream into a bowl and whisk a tablespoon of soup into it, then another, then slowly start stirring the cream into the soup. Mix half the gherkin bits into it and use the remainder as "croutons".

In Poland we have a much loved gherkin soup, which gave me the idea to use gherkins in this way. This is a very simple soup yet the gherkins give it a fun twist. They're mini bombs of flavour in your mouth, exploding with a zesty juiciness and cutting through the the taste of  the other ingredients.

Ingredients (5-6 portions)

3 chicken drumsticks

100g pearl barley

2-3 potatoes

2 carrots, cubed

2 celery stick, chopped

1 leek, chopped

1/2 white cabbage 

Sea salt

White and black pepper

8-10 gherkins

Large pan of water

Grandma's sorrel and yoghurt soup

Whenever I eat sorrel now it reminds me of this lovely day, a couple of years ago, when my grans were still alive. It was just ordinary summer's day then, mooching about, cooking, sunbathing... yet it will always live on in my memory as something extraordinary and special, a reminder that all things pass and to cherish the moments we have with our loved ones. This sorrel soup is different to the cold one I made that day

Once you've got hold of the sorrel, either by foraging or by buying some in an online shop like this one, the soup is very simple to make. It tastes just like the one my Babcia Ziuta used to make, yet the recipe comes not from her but from this lady's grandma

That's the lady who sold us the sorrel at the market. We always wash the sorrel thoroughly first. Fry it in a large knob of butter until it wilts. Allow it to cool for about 20min, then blend. The old method is to push it through a sieve with a wooden spoon, but blending is much easier, so I suggest to do that. Put it in the biggest pan you can find and fill half-way with cold water. Bring to the boil, then turn the heat down and simmer for half an hour. Near the end of the cooking time, we season the soup with salt and pepper and thicken with plain flour, stirring all the time. Bring it back to the boil for 5min, allowing the flour to do it's job.

Before adding the yoghurt, we allow the soup to cool down a little bit again, for about 20-30min. The lady's grandma would have used thick cream rather than yoghurt I expect but the lady uses yoghurt and it works very well. Not to mention being healthier. So you do it like this: put the yoghurt you intend to use in a large cup and add a tablespoon of soup, stir it in. Add another tablespoon and stir it in. Repeat about 5 times. Finally, pour the whole thing into the soup and stir vigorously. Heat the soup a little before serving. Hard boiled eggs inside each bowl are a necessary addition, the potatoes with dill are optional but highly desirable

Ingredients

1 large bag of sorrel
50g butter
3 tablespoons flour
150ml greek yoghurt
Salt and white pepper
Hard boiled eggs

Nettle soup with chickpeas and feta

If your garden is anything like mine then you'll have plenty of stinging nettles in it at this time of year

This is in fact the ideal time of year to cook with them, as they are still young. Once they have flowered, they are too old

Pick them with gloves on, obviously, then pour some boiling water over them, and they're ready to use! I added mine to this refreshing, zingy soup, but you can use them in any recipes that require spinach or greens

For the soup, you will need to soak the chickpeas and peas over night (you can also use lentils instead of the peas), then simmer in a large pan of boiling water with some fresh ginger and the chopped red chilli for about an hour, taking any scum off the top when it starts bubbling up. At the same time, cook the rice. After about an hour, add the halved cherry tomatoes and the chopped nettles to the soup and squeeze in one of the limes. Season with fish sauce, black pepper and paprika and allow to simmer for another half an hour or until the tomatoes have completely disintegrated. To finish, squeeze in the remaining lime and serve on top of the rice, crumbling feta cheese on top. The amounts below are all approximate, use whatever you feel is appropriate to your tastes

Ingredients

200g dried chickpeas

50g dried peas or lentils

Large handful of nettles

100g cherry tomatoes

2 limes

Red chilli pepper, chopped finely

Tablespoon fish sauce

Inch of fresh ginger

1/2 teaspoon paprika

Black pepper to taste

200g feta

50-100g cooked rice per person

Polish chicken and tomato soup

In Poland, and throughout most of Eastern Europe, soups will probably be made with animal stock. If you are a vegetarian - beware - you may think you are safe ordering a vegetable soup, and the maker of it may not even consider the bones that the stock has been cooked on and happily tell you that you are eating a vegetarian soup. Because, you know, there's no "proper" meat in it, just a few bones... sometimes, it's easier to believe people, but the truth is always there if you delve a bit deeper. This applies not only to soups but also to life. I've realized that all you need to do is really want it, and commit to honesty within yourself, then the truth will always come to you. I'm talking from a lot of experience here...

You start off by cooking the chicken carcasses along with the vegetables and bay leaf (if you have one) in a big pan filled with cold water and a bit of sea salt for about 2 hours. Cook the rice separately. Remove the chicken carcasses and all the vegetables. Take any remaining meat off the carcasses and put it back into the soup, chop the carrot and put it back in too, discard the remaining vegetables. Add the tomato puree and season well with salt, pepper and a little bit of sugar. Add the cream and heat for a little while longer. Taste and decide if it needs anything else. Pour the soup over the rice and consume hot, perhaps with a sprinkling of hot chilli sauce if you fancy it (this is not a Polish thing, but a Zuza thing)

Ingredients

2 good quality (organic) chicken carcasses
1 parsnip
1 large carrot
2 celery stalks
Bay leaf (optional)
150ml single cream
1 tub of tomato puree
Rice
Sea salt
Black pepper
Large pinch of sugar
Chilli sauce if you fancy it

Polish wild mushroom soup with crunchy macaroni

I love the smell of dried, wild mushrooms so much that when I open the box, I can barely tear them away from my nose. Recently, my mum asked my auntie whether she'd taken any of her wild mushrooms that were standing in the kitchen, to which my aunt's response was "No, I was just smelling them", so I guess this fascination is common. The smell is pungent, musky and sweet all at the same time, almost sexual in a dark, unexplained way

So I used these mushrooms to make a very simple, clear, wild mushroom soup. As it contains macaroni, it is quite substantial so you can have it for dinner, however, I also used some of the vegetables from the stock to make a Russian salad too, for starters

First, wash and rehydrate the mushrooms, rinse and cover in boiling water twice. Make the second bowl quite large, and keep them in there for a good few hours, then keep this brown, flavoursome water. To make the vegetable stock, cook a large peeled carrot, a parsnip, an onion, a potato (if you are making the salad, otherwise, forget it) and some celery in a massive pan of salted water. Remove the carrot, parsnip and potato after 30min if you are making the salad. Continue cooking the other stuff for another half an hour. Combine the two stocks: the mushroom and the vegetable, season well with salt and pepper, and bring it back to the boil. Chop the mushrooms and add them to the pan. Cook for another 20min, and meanwhile make the macaroni. Once it is ready, drain and then fry it in some butter until crunchy. Serve the two together

A hearty pumpkin soup with pork and pearl barley

I know that hearty soups without meat do exist (I'm sure they do), and I certainly do not feel the need to eat meat every day of the week, yet I have found that the addition of meaty goodness is what constitutes a hearty soup for me personally. At the risk of sounding like a witch, I always like to boil a good carcass. To make my own stock or as a soup base. And I get 2 carcasses for £1 at Ginger Pig, so it's a small price to pay for the depth that it will give a dish. I also bought some good quality lardons from them (by good quality I mean from happy pigs, which is the only kind I like to eat), so this soup is more than a little meaty

Start off by making the chicken and onion stock - boil a couple of carcasses with a peeled onion and some salt for 2-3 hours. You can add a bay leaf in there if you have one, I didn't. Meanwhile, roast the pumpkin, in chunks, with some olive oil and salt, for about 20min. It's much easier to peel then. Drain the stock into a new pan, so that you are left with a clear liquid. Add the pumpkin chunks and any meat that's on the carcasses to the clear stock and allow to cool. Blend. Pour it back in the pan, season with garlic salt, black pepper and nutmeg, then add the pearl barley and bring back to the boil. Simmer until pearl barley is ready (about 30min). Chop the lardons up if they are quite big, like mine were, then fry until crispy. Add to the soup. Deglaze the pan with the soup to get all the flavour off it. Add chilli sauce if you like it spicy

 Ingredients

Half a pumpkin

2 chicken carcasses

1 onion

Handful of Lardons

Pearl barley (large handful)

Garlic salt

Black pepper

Nutmeg

Chilli sauce

Olive oil

As for the seeds, you may want to roast them for an hour with some salt and a little olive oil. Half way through, sprinkle with a little soya sauce and chilli sauce for an amazing beer snack. I like to leave a bit of the pith on there too as it turns brown and crunchy

Middle-Eastern Chicken Soup

Eating certain foods, even their smell, has the power to take you back in time. There's the obvious dishes associated with certain countries and there's the more subtle - corn-on-the-cob, for example, will always make me think of childhood summers spent in Hungary, Spanish rosé - of one particular, pebbly beach on Ibiza Island and a chilled, cut up Mars bar (this is the only way I ever eat a Mars bar now) takes me straight back to a tent in the Himalayas. This is precisely why I haven't eaten this soup in about 3 years, even though there was a time when it was one of my favourites. We used to eat it nearly every Sunday in my last long-term relationship,  the stock made from the bones left over from our lunchtime roast - sometimes this was chicken, more often it was game birds. Perhaps it was less often than that, and this is just how I've remembered that period. Either way, it has always reminded me of the sweet moments in that relationship, which I didn't want to be reminded of for a very long time. Now, I don't mind anymore

You cook the chicken carcass with an onion in a large pan of water for as long as you can - I usually manage 2-3 hours. Remove the meat and the onion from the pan and add the (rinsed) rice. Once the rice is cooked, season the soup well with salt and pepper and put any nice bits of chicken meat back in. Take it off the heat. Beat the eggs, add a spoonful of soup and carry on beating, then add some more. Keep doing this for a little white before adding the mixture back into the soup and beating all together - the idea is that the soup becomes creamy without the egg curdling in it. Finally, stir in the lemon juice and serve. I love sour things, so I may squeeze more lemon in, but I would suggest you start off with just the one and see how it goes. There isn't much that I don't love about this soup - it's comforting and creamy, wholesome and healing, it fills you up without making you feel stuffed

Ingredients

Chicken carcass

1 onion

100g rice

2 eggs

Juice of 1 lemon

Salt and pepper

My mum's Ukrainian borsht

Last Saturday my brother and I rented a van, loaded it up with unwanted furniture and drove down to Eastbourne, on the South Coast. It was a beautiful, sunny weekend, more Spring than Winter, full of champagne (it was dad's birthday) and delicious food, with intermittent spurts of physical labour, family jokes and those insignificant arguments that our family are so prone to having. My mum cooked one of my favourite Polish soups - the "Ukrainian Borsht". Polish dish naming conventions can be massively confusing, yet I do believe that this particular borsht recipe, rich with meat, potatoes and beans, did in fact originate in the Ukraine. Since the Ukraine is only a few hours' drive east of Warsaw, it is very popular around our parts, and deservedly so. In my (entirely biased) opinion, out of all the borshts out there (and there are many, many), this is the best

We left on Sunday afternoon, feeling uplifted and energized, and drove through the cheerful Sussex countryside discussing the importance of having the right kind of people in your life. The kind that make you feel inspired and optimistic, and those that make you feel calm and content too, and the ultimate importance of being able to say goodbye to those that do the opposite

Ingredients

1 large rump steak
2 carrot, grated
2 parsnips, grated
2 celery stalks, chopped finely
1 leek, chopped finely
1 bay leaf
1 teaspoon pimento berries
4 beetroot
1 tin chopped tomatoes
2 tins butter beans
3 potatoes
250ml double cream
Salt, pepper and sugar
Handful chopped parsley
Cup of beetroot juice (optional)

Make the meaty stock first - cook the steak with the pimento berries and bay leaf for about half an hour in a pan of cold water. Then, add the vegetables and potatoes. Cook the beets separately, then peel and cut into thin strips. Chuck them into the mix, along with the tin of tomatoes and butter beans. Remove the steak and chop into bitesize pieces before putting back into the soup. Season with salt, pepper and sugar now. If your soup is not red enough for your liking, you may add some beetroot juice. Allow to simmer for 10min, then add the double cream, parsley and season some more, to your own taste

Warming lentil soup with crispy-fried potatoes

As much as I love to make plans, sometimes I love to cancel plans even more. This is precisely what I did today, resulting in one incredibly pleasant Saturday. If you are lucky enough to be able to cancel everything and have a duvet day, then I recommend it. This is how I spent mine: drank good coffee while writing in bed; popped out to buy a sausage sandwich from Mess Cafe; drank more coffee while writing some more; cuddled up to Coco the cat; went for an laughably short run, then back into Mess Cafe to buy another sausage sandwich - this time for a homeless person with sad eyes; had a bath; got back into bed and messed around on facebook; drank more good coffee and powered by that coffee I wrote some more; tickled Coco for a bit; surfed the internet; made that hearty lentil soup you see down there and ate it greedily congratulating myself with every spoonful, popped out to get some honey and discovered Malt Extract at Holland and Barrett (if you could have an orgasm from food, then this is the food that would give it to you - enough said); made flapjacks with the said Malt Extract; did a spot of Kundalini yoga and meditation... and here I am now, feeling rather pleased with myself and shamelessly cancelling more plans

 

Ingredients (4 servings)

250 grams red lentils

1/2 red onion, chopped finely

1 carrot, grated

1 red chilli, chopped

1 clove of garlic, choped

1l vegetable stock

Tin of chopped tomates

1/2 teaspoon coriander

1/2 teaspoon cumin

1/2 teaspoon paprika

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1 tablespoon soya sauce

1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar

1 teaspoon honey

Plenty of water

Potatoes, chopped but not peeled

Olive oil

Salt and pepper

1 duvet day, optional

Fry the onion and chilli for a couple of minutes in some olive oil. Add the carrot, garlic and spices, and fry some more. Add the lentils (I didn't need to soak mine, but soak yours first if this is what it says on the packet) and the stock. Turn the heat down, cover and leave to simmer for 20min. About now, you may want to start frying your chopped potatoes. Do this on a reasonably high heat so that they get all nice'n'crispy. Stir the chopped tomatoes into your soup, and add the soya sauce, vinegar and honey. Allow to simmer for another 20min, then add plenty of water (so that the soup is of a consistency that you enjoy most), season with salt and pepper, and allow to simmer for another 10mins before serving with your crispy potatoes inside.The thing about this soup, is that it's even better eaten the next day, just add more water, simmer for 10 more minutes and add some fresh crispy-fried potatoes

Savoury porridge

This wondrous spotted creature is my savoury porridge 

It's loosely based on these breakfast soups that I eat in Thailand, which are made out of rice -  a British version, I guess. I cooked the oats with water and a little salt, then added some beef stock. I topped it off with bits of crispy pre-fried onion and garlic, soya sauce and tabasco. I absolutely loved it, but if you don't think your stomach could handle this first thing, then it would also make a lovely, warming supper. I take my leave of you now for a little while, as I go to Poland on an emergency visit. My beautiful Babcia Ziuta (that's my grandma), one of the people I love most on the entire planet, is in critical condition in hospital. I have no idea what's going to happen next. It's one of those times when the immensity of life hits you straight in the face

Cabbage soup with apple and ginger

I was inspired to make cabbage soup by this lovely lady. However, the only ingredients out of the ones I needed for Bess's ketchupy soup was an onion, cabbage and ketchup, and that didn't sound too appetizing, so I actually made a completely different cabbage soup with apple and ginger instead. The sentiment is the same though, because this is not the diet kind either. I used plenty of butter and parmesan to make it really lovely. This is not the time of year for detoxing and dieting in my opinion, I am literally just trying to get through. For me that involves sleeping for at least 9 hours a day, sitting in a hot bath a lot and eating whatever I feel like. I firmly believe we should all be hibernating right now: cooking, eating comforting food, sitting by the fire with our loved ones drinking mulled wine, and not getting up at 7am to go to work. This seems like an unnatural and evil madness to me at this time of year

Ingredients

Onion, chopped

Half a cabbage (I used a green leafy one)

1 inch piece fresh ginger, peeled and chopped

Apple, peeled and chopped

3 potatoes, peeled and chopped

Chicken stock

Butter

Parmesan, grated

1/2tsp chilli

Splash of single cream

Salt and pepper

Fry the onion in the butter until soft, then add the ginger, chilli and apple. Fry for a little while longer, before adding the shredded cabbage and the stock. I used a stock cube, which was fine, though if I'd had a bit of chicken on the bone, I would have taken my time and made some proper stock first. Allow this to cook for at least half an hour. Then blend a little bit. I allowed it to cool first before blitzing for literally 2 seconds, you don't want it too smooth. Now add the potatoes and bring back to the boil. Cook until the spuds are soft, another half an hour or thereabouts. Finally, season, stir in a splash of cream and some parmesan. Serve with more grated parmesan on top, and preferably a fruit crumble to follow. Proper comfort food that is

Cuban green plantain soup

Hello! I'm still here, I just haven't been blogging as much as I'd like to be recently. I might have mentioned before that I have an emotional relationship with food. And so when my emotions are all over the shop, as they have been recently, I can't focus on what I love to do. Which is a shame, as it would probably help. This plantain soup (from A Taste of Cuba by Beatriz Llamas) sure managed to comfort me. I knew it would, which is why I've been meaning to make it for a week now, but even though there are plantains all over Hackney, I couldn't find the right ones in my closest shops, and I didn't have the tenacity or emotional strength to go searching further afield. They need to be green, you see, not speckled or yellow. Apart from that though, it was so simple - only four ingredients! Or five if you count the tabasco

Ingredients

2-3 Green plantains

Beef stock - about a pint

Juice of 1 lime

2 Garlic cloves

Tabasco to serve

Salt and pepper

You peel the plantains, cut them into inch long chucks and cook for about 40-50min in the stock, then blend along with the garlic and seasoning. I was making the soup last night, so left it in the fridge overnight then blended it today. I don't like blending hot liquids, as I tend to get burnt one way or another. Beatriz now asks you to sieve the soup. I started to do this, but then realized that I liked the grainy texture and stopped, you carry on if you must. It will probably make the soup look nicer. Then heat it up along with the lime juice. I'd suggest serving it with tabasco, but again, this is my own innovation, apparently Cubans aren't into spicy food

Warming wild rabbit stew/soup

Vegetarians look away now - it's shooting season in the UK and the butcher shops are full of pheasant, partridge, grouse and wild rabbit. I am typing this while eating a delicious rabbit and spinach stew/soup (depending on how you look at it), the recipe for which I would like to share with you, even though it was a by-product of another dish I was making - a "huntsman bake", for which I needed strips of rabbit. So, I was left with the bones with plenty of meat still attached, that I didn't have the will to scrape off with my not-so-great knife. I covered these in cold water, added a couple of bay leaves, a cinnamon stick and some garlic cloves and allowed to boil for 2-3 hours, adding water as it evaporated. I then allowed it to cool, and the next day, I took the carcass out, pulling any meat off it. I brought the stock back to the boil, this time adding lots of pearl barley. When the grains were soft, I added spinach leaves, salt, pepper, a squeeze of lemon and finished it off with tabasco

Ingredients

Rabbit carcass (preferably in bits and with some meat still on it)

Pearl barley

Spinach

Cinnamon stick

2 bay leaves

3 garlic cloves

Squeeze of lemon

Salt and pepper

Tabasco

In doing research for my cookbook, I've been learning about hunting in Eastern Europe. A fact that made me particularly proud of my countrymen was that, throughout Polish history, women were just as keen hunters as men. One piece of poetry that I read, from the 16th Century, suggested that many men found women more attractive in this sort of pursuit than dolled up in tight dresses! This makes me happy because it feels like the ultimate liberation from stereotypes. It's men loving women for what they are, and women being free to be what they are - natural, strong and fierce - rather than feeling forced to create a permanent ladylike illusion. There's hope yet...

Cold sorrel soup

If you read this blog, then you may know already that in the summer, just like the Spanish eat gazpacho, we the Polaks, eat chlodnik. A couple of days ago, we tried something completely different and a little bit naughty - instead of the traditional beetroot, we used sorrel

 

In the UK, you may need to go to a Farmers' Market to get some. We picked it from the field oppsite our house. Being the graceful nymph that I am, I quickly picked a good sorrel spot and found a nice little area to park my behind. I soon learnt that my perfect seat was, in actual fact, an ants' nest. Needless to say that the valiant ants mobilized their forces and fought back the intruder. If you still feel like venturing out and seeing if you can find some, it looks like that down there. To be sure, just chew on a bit of a leaf - if it tastes sour, then you're in business

 

Ingredients

150g sorrel leaves (and stalks too)

2 Polish cucumbers (the size of a hand) or 1 English one

Large handful chives

1l vegetable stock

4 eggs

100ml natural yoghurt

100ml single cream

Salt and pepper

Chilli flakes

And those are my grans separating the sorrel from the weeds...so if you've picked your own this is the first job. Then, you need to make the stock, whatever kind you're using. Clean and chop the sorrel, cover with the stock, and allow to cool. In the meantime, hard boil the eggs as well as finely chopping the cucumber and chives. Once the soup has cooled to room temperature, mix everything together, apart from the eggs. Cool for at least an hour in the fridge. When serving, add the eggs and finish off with more chilli flakes. You could add a squeeze of lemon if you like, although you shouldn't need to. I always do, because if something is sour or spicy, I like to feel it. Anyway, here are a few cool things I saw on our adventure in the fields...

An ants' nest, not unlike the one I sat on

 

"Kozak" - A handsome, tasty mushroom we call a Cossack

 And a sleepy transformation

Yucatecan Chicken Soup to make you feel better

All around the world, when ill, people eat chicken soup. One of the best is a really simple Polish/Jewish- style one called rosol. My mum and gran used to make it all the time when I was little. Once I was so ill that it was the only thing I was allowed to eat for three days. Since then, rosol has been a no-go for me. However, I have been feeling unwell for a day and a bit now, which has left me both starving and feeling a bit frightened of food, so chicken soup it is. I dug out a recipe that I found in the metro about two years ago - yes, I keep all the good ones - for a Yucatecan one (that's sort of Mexican, if you have no idea what I'm talking about). It's a bit like rosol, but tangy and spicy - my kind of thing. I went and bought myself a nice, free range chicken thigh from Ginger Pig (of course) , and then nearly burned the house down. I decided to make the stock while running a few errands, but I forgot to cover the chicken with water. As I said, I've been really out of it. Luckily, when I came back about an hour later, the chicken skin was brown on one side and the flat smelled really strongly of roast chicken but was all in one piece

As you can see, I was so hungry that I imagined myself capable of eating a whole salad-bowl of soup. In fact, my stomach has shrunk and I was full after just a few mouthfuls, but that's not a reflection on its deliciousness. I will now happily eat it for the next three days

Ingredients

1 chicken thigh

1 medium onion

2 carrots

1 celery stick

1 orange

3 limes

1 red chilli

1 garlic clove

Fresh coriander

All purpose seasoning/Allspice

Salt and pepper

Olive oil

So, what I was supposed to do was to boil the chicken thigh, along with a carrot, a celery stick, half an onion and a bit of the coriander for about half an hour. On the side, you make a sofrito - chop and fry the following: the other half of the onion, the other carrot, a garlic clove, the chilli and the tomatoes with a teaspoon of allspice or all purpose seasoning. Then, take all the stuff out of the stock and mix the two (you may want to a ladle-full of stock to the sofrito first, to catch all the flavours). Simmer for another 20 minutes, and while that's happening, take the skin off the chicken, and flake all the meat off, adding it back into the soup. Squeeze the orange and limes in, add the coriander, season and serve

Strangely, I've found that being ill can give you clarity. Having some time just lying on your bed with nothing to do but reflect on yourself and your life is clearly good thing

One last pumpkin dance: the polish, pumpkin breakfast soup

So winter is well and truly here

And yet I still have one more pumkin recipe for you. It's the ultimate pumpkin recipe really, as it is the one I grew up with. As I am at my parents' house in Eastbourne, and there has been a pumpkin sitting in the kitchen since the last time I was here (in September!) which my mum didn't know what to do with, I thought I'd take advantage and remind her about a childhood dish that she used to always make for me at this time of year when we were still living in Poland, and for a time after we moved too. She wasn't sure if she remembered how to make it anymore, but it turned out that her hands had a memory of their own thankfully, so the Polish pumkin soup will live on after all. This is a pumpkin soup with a difference though, because it's sweet and eaten for breakfast

  

Ingredients

1 small pumpkin

150-200g flour

1 egg

700ml milk

1tsp salt

1tblsp sugar

Water

 

Sorry about the photo up there, my mum decided to make the "zacierki" when I was asleep and take the photo herself, and unfortunately it turned out fuzzy. Let me start off by explaining the concept of "zacierki" - they are a cross between little pasta shapes and dumplings, and you can use them in a variety of dishes. They are an integral part of the Polish pumpkin soup. You make them by combining the flour and egg with a little water and forming a dough ball. The dough ball is ready when it stops being sticky and falls away from your hand - just add more flour if it's too sticky. At this point, you have a choice about whether to make the "zacierki" yourself by ripping little bits of the dough ball to form little maggotty shapes - sorry for the comparison, that really is the only way I can think of to exactly describe the size and shape of the thing. Or, if you have time, then you can do what my mum did and put the dough ball in the freezer. Then, once it is hard and you are ready to cook, you take it out and grate it, as shown on the photo. For the actual soup, you cook the pumpkin chunks in a little water until soft, which can take up to 20min. In a separate pan, you cook the "zacierki" in the milk, which takes about 5min. Then, you combine the two, adding sugar and salt to taste

 

It's a really lovely, comforting soup, but then when you have grown up with something, I guess it always is comforting. It may actually taste unusual to a different palate, especially a British one, but anyhow, if you're adventurous, then it's worth giving it a go, because it is something a bit different... I am starting a course of antibiotics today - whopee! It may be a strange thing to get excited about, but I haven't slept properly for a week, and I want my life back. There's some horrible bugs going around out there, so keep warm and look after yourself!

Pumpkin soup

It's that time of the year again...

The nights are closing in and there's a nip in the air, who wouldn't want some pumpkin soup? This is one I made last week for myself and my uncle Kazik who is staying with me right now, doing my floors and finishing off all the stuff that the builders have given up on. Soup is always better, in my experience, when you take your time with it. Therefore, I cooked it one night, left it to cool, then blended it the next morning, adding the cream. We then warmed it up and ate it for dinner for two nights running, the second night with penne pasta, which worked really well, and made it into a more complete meal

Ingredients

1 small pumpkin, cut into chunks, with seeds taken out

1 leek, chopped

1 carrot, chopped

1 parsnip, chopped

1 green chilli 

Chicken or vegetable stock

1 tblsp butter

1 tblsp olive oil

1 small single cream

Salt and pepper

Roast the pumpkin in olive oil, with salt and pepper, at about 180 degrees C for about an hour. In the meantime, fry the leek, chilli, carrot and parsnip in the butter. Once they are translucent, add the stock (or water if you prefer) and bring to the boil, then turn the heat down and simmer. Once the pumpkin is ready, peel it and add the bits to the soup, then carry on cooking for another half an hour or so, seasoning at the end. At this point, I turned the heat off and left the soup to infuse overnight, before blending and adding the cream. There's a Polish saying about relationships, which translates as "I don't like my soup reheated". It means that you shouldn't go back to old relationships and try to "reheat" them. I find it so strange, because soup is definitely better reheated, everyone knows that.  Conclusion: sayings that don't make any sense are annoying