True Eggplant

For the last couple of months or so, Monday nights have been known as True Blood nights. We gather at a friend's house, eat delicious eggplant-centric dishes, play with an adorable kitten and gradually work our way through 3 seasons of vampire flavoured ridiculousness. It's a pretty great tradition. I'm not sure how the eggplant came into it. But after a few weeks, having a True Blood night without eggplant seemed as odd as a TB episode without blood. Or boobs. Or Eric.

So I've been racking up the eggplant recipes. And making them up, as needs be. One of them worked out pretty dang well, so I thought I'd share it with you here.

Eggplant and Lentil Soup (serves 5)

(adapted from an amazing lentil soup recipe sent to me by this cupcake queen)

This soup is my new favourite thing ever. It's simple to make, warm, spicy, nourishing, and fucking delicious. Serve it with some crusty wholemeal bread and red wine, and you have yourselves the perfect accompaniment to some tasty vampire melodrama.

What you need:

2 cloves of garlic
1 large eggplant

2 tins of tomato

1 tin of brown lentils. Make it 2 if you really love your lentils

1/2 tbsp of butter (vegan if you use oil)

3 cups veggie stock

1 tsp turmeric

1/2 tsp garam masala

1/2 tsp ground ginger

1/2 tsp yellow mustard seeds

1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

1/4 tsp dried chilli flakes (more or less to taste)

.

.

What you need to do:

Wash and then dice the eggplant into bite size pieces, about 2cm square.

Steam over boiling water for 5 - 8 minutes, covered and turning occasionally. Remove when tender, but still firm. You'll want to taste, not just poke.

Fry the garlic in the butter for a couple of minutes, and then add the drained lentils.

Saute for a couple minutes longer, and then add the tinned tomatoes, stock and spices.

Throw in the eggplant, and cook together for about ten minutes

Then enjoy with a little bit of this:

Fuck You Winter

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You know, I love scarves. And coats. And gloves with bows on them. And I like it when your breath fogs in the cold, and you can pretend you're a smoker (you may also like to pretend you work with Donald Draper). I love frost that lasts until midday, air that tastes like snow, and the fog on Lake Burley Griffin.

I like winter. But you know what? I am tired of being freezing cold all the time. If you live in Canberra you're probably going to work while the temperature is below zero. That's just not right. I don't think the work day should begin until the temperature's back in the pluses. Just a suggestion, Stanhope.

But I write (sitting on top of the heater in my lounge room) with an idea: eat soup all the time. I admit it's nothing revolutionary. People have been fighting winter with soup since the dawn of time. Or at least the dawn of soup. But if you're yet to break out the soup pot, here's a recipe to get you started. It's adapted from the wonderful cook book Moosewood Restaurant Daily Special. The Moosewood Restaurant is a New York State based collective, with an emphasis on organic, vegetarian, wholesome food. Read more about them here. This soup reminds me of the best of winter: home, hearth and heart.



Tomato, Barley and Spinach Soup

The original recipe calls for kale and sun-dried tomatoes not packed in oil. I couldn't find either, so I used spinach and roasted some fresh tomatoes. It turned out rather lovely.

What You Will Need

1/3 cup pearl barley
2 bay leaves
5 cups water
7 large fresh tomatoes
1 tbsp olive oil
salt and pepper
2 garlic cloves, minced or crushed
1 red onion, diced
2 400ml tins of crushed tomatoes
1 tsp dried rosemary
1 generous pinch of cayenne pepper
2 cups of fresh, washed spinach or kale

What you will need to do

Preheat your oven to 170 degrees C.

Halve the fresh tomatoes, and toss with olive oil, salt and pepper. Place cut side down on a lightly oiled baking tray, and then put into the oven. Roast for 30 minutes minimum (there really isn't a maximum when it comes to roasting tomatoes).

Combine water, bay leaves and barley in a soup pot (non-reactive is best) and bring to the boil. Simmer for 20 minutes.

In a separate pan, fry onion and garlic until soft and translucent, 10 - 15 minutes.

When the barley is cooked remove the bay leaves and add cooked onion and garlic, tinned tomatoes, rosemary, and cayenne.

Remove the tomatoes from the oven, and slip the skins off. Discard the skins. Roughly chop or break up the tomatoes, and add to the soup.

Simmer for a further 10 minutes, or until soup is the desired thickness.

Add the spinach or kale, and stir through until wilted.

Serve with some bread, some wine, some friends, and a finger raised to the heavens.

Traditional Lamb Shank Soup

My next contribution to Soup Week is a delicious Lamb Shank soup. My Nan served this soup up for Sunday Lunch when I last visited, and I enjoyed it so much that I asked for the recipe. Nanny tells me that this is one of her mother's recipes, and it makes me feel all warm inside to think that I'm enjoying this dish so many years after my great-grandmother first prepared it. It's traditional and delicious, perfect winter fare.

What You Will Need:

• 2 large carrots
• 2 large sticks of celery
• 1 large potato
• 1 large onion
• 1 large or two small zucchini
• Any other vegetables you'd like to add to your soup (I included a tin of diced tomatoes in the soup pictured above)
• 1 cup of pearl barley
• 3 or 4 lamb shanks depending on how far you'd like your soup to stretch (I'd suggest four if you're feeding four or more people, especially if the shanks themselves are small)
• Approximately 1.5 litres of vegetable stock
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 cup of fresh parsley, and any other herbs you might like to add to your broth
• Salt, pepper and parmesan cheese to taste

What You Will Need To Do:

1. Dice all the vegetables, brown them slightly in a little olive oil, then pour over the vegetable stock (and tinned tomatoes if you're using them) Bring the lot to the boil.

2. Add the lamb shanks, pearl barley, bay leaf and any other dry herbs to the soup mix. Turn the heat down so your soup is simmering gently. You may need to add more stock to the soup here, depending on how much liquid the pearl barley absorbs as it cooks.

3. Simmer your soup until the lamb begins to fall from the bone. Remove the lamb shanks and roughly carve up the meat, then add back to the soup along with your chopped parsley. Serve hot with a little pepper and parmesan cheese on top.

This is the first ever meat recipe to appear on our little blog, I'm clearly not a vegetarian but I try to eat ethically, and I buy my meat from rare breed and organic butchers who source their produce from smaller farms that aim to minimise their impact on the environment. If you're a fellow inner-city Melburnian who is looking to support ethical farming, I'd suggest shopping at The Queen Victoria Markets in town, as a few of their butchers sell rare breed and organic meats from smaller, local producers. In addition, the Rare Breeds Trust of Australia is a useful resource if you're concerned with buying ethically sourced meat, and they support the lovely Collingwood Children's Farm, a worthy project operating out of Melbourne, and a gorgeous spot to enjoy breakfast too.

Flow Chart Pumpkin Soup

I had some trouble transcribing this recipe, because I’ve never made it the same way twice.

Which is the joy of pumpkin soup, really: pumpkin + stock + various herbs = delicious. There are no two ways around it! But much like skinning the proverbial cat, there are many ways to do it. So, because I can’t really remember how I made the one I photographed, and because my new office job has given me flow chart skills I rarely get to utilise in the real word, here is Pumpkin Soup Three Ways.


Sweet Roast Pumpkin Soup

+

Curry Pumpkin Soup

+

Winter Vegetable Pumpkin Soup


What You Will Need


These guys: 1 sweet potato, 1/2 a butternut pumpkin, 1/4 jap pumpkin

Roast Soup:

• 1 onion

• 2 cloves garlic

• 4 - 6 cups vegetable stock

• 1 tbsp cumin

• 1 tsp nutmeg

• 1 tsp dried sage

• 100 grams cream cheese

Curry Soup:

• Curry powder, or your favourite blend of curry spices

• 1 tsp dried chilli seeds

• 1 onion

• 2 cloves of garlic

• 3-4 cups vegetable stock

• 1 225 ml tin of coconut cream

• Fresh coriander

• Fried shallots

• *optional: boiled, soaked or tinned lentils for some extra protein.
  

Winter Soup:

• I brown onion

• A couple of cloves of garlic

• Not essential, but quite nice: any carrot, leek, or celery you might have

• Butter and olive oil

• Dried or fresh parsley and thyme

• Chicken or beef stock

• Sour cream

• Croutons

What You Will Need to Do

Attempt to make sense of the following, hideously coloured flow chart:

Hopefully your flowchart adventures will end up looking something like this:

And tasting something like delicious.

Soup Week Leek Soup

aaa

While I'm not exactly rockin' the student lifestyle like Tara is, I am rockin' the recession. Well, not so much rockin' it as resenting it, really... my job security is low, my income is lower, and all this talk of consumer confidence indexes makes me want to crawl under my doona and sleep the doom and gloom of the 'GFC' away. Sadly my job requires me to get out of bed each day, so I've turned my recession fear from a cowering desire never to look at the news again into a new found frugality, lest I suddenly find myself in need of that thing, what's it called? Oh. Savings.

Today's soup costs next to nothing to make, it's damn well recession proof and a worthy contribution to Soup Week 2009.

Cheap and Easy Potato and Leek Soup

What You Will Need:

• 5 leeks (or is it just leek?)
• 2 large potatoes
• Lots of garlic
• A big sprig of fresh rosemary
• Salt reduced vegetable stock (about a litre and a half, I think)
• Salt, pepper and parmesan cheese to taste. Maybe some croutons too, if you're feeling fancy.

What You Will Need To Do:

1. Thinly slice the leek and dice the potato.

2. Heat a generous lump of butter in the bottom of a deep saucepan, then add the leek, potato, rosemary sprig and a couple of big garlic cloves, stir so the veggies are coated in butter and cook on a low heat until the leek is sweating.

3. Once the leek is limp and sweaty (I know you're all licking your lips at that delicious description) and is tender rather than tough, add the vegetable stock and bring the whole lot to the boil.

4. Simmer for at least fifteen minutes, then remove half of the soup mixture - leaving the rosemary sprig in the pot -and blend until smooth. Pour the blended soup back in with the chunky stuff and stir the lot to combine.

5. Serve hot hot hot with parmesan cheese on top, and some buttery toast on the side. You can blend the soup up completely if you prefer your soup smooth rather than chunky, but I quite like some of the potato and leek to stay chunky, for a bit of dimension.

I wouldn't recommend this recipe to anybody who doesn't enjoy the taste of leek, for fairly obvious reasons. Leeky in taste, leeky in smell. This is an altogether leeky sort of a meal. The soup is really creamy and delicious, and if you lose the cheese and use olive oil in place of butter the recipe is also vegan. It's really cheap to make, the last time I cooked it the only ingredients I had to cough up for were the leek themselves, the rest I had sitting in the pantry. So if you're worried that capitalism is about to come crashing down around us and we'd better start squirelling away the pennies before we're unemployed and starving, don't reach for the migoreng just yet! It is possible to prepare a meal on the cheap without compromising on taste or nutrition.

Check back soon for more delicious soupy goodness, and while you're here please enjoy this lonely little number. The perfect accompaniment to a day spent hiding under one's doona...

Roast Tomato and Capsicum Soup, Oh My

Oh my god, you guys! Welcome to soup week. Or, Week O' Soup, as I think of it.

It seems right to have our first themed week dedicated to soup. Who doesn’t love it? If you're rocking the student lifestyle, it’s perfect for either entertaining, or feeding you for a week, whichever you prefer. And it’s so adaptable – get some delicious base ingredients, and play around with methods, herbs and spices and you can get fantastic variations out of one simple recipe.

Which is what I did with the following – craving something with tomato and capsicum one chilly winter evening I got on my internet machine and hunted up a recipe. Souvlaki for the Soul didn’t disappoint with his Roast Capsicum and Tomato Soup. The perfect accompaniment to a winter night on the couch with friends indulging in the Jurassic Park trilogy.

The first time I made it was to the letter, with a sweet, rich tomato soup as end product. The second time I made it I adjusted to what was in my cupboard, substituting fresh flat leaf parsley for basil, paprika for chili, and using fennel and oregano to season the roasting tomatoes instead of balsamic vinegar. I ended up with a lovely robust winter soup, with vegetable stock flavours that really brought out the potato and capsicum, and a delightful warm red colour that really brought out the carnage in Jurassic Park 2.

Tomato and Capsicum Soup
Original recipe here.

What You Will Need

• 8 roma tomatoes, halved lengthways

• 2 large red capsicums

• 1 large or 2 medium desiree or red rascal potatoes

• 2 cloves of garlic

• Olive oil

• 2 tsp Fennel seeds

• 1/2 cup fresh flat leaf parsley

• 1 generous tbsp ground paprika

• A few good shakes dried oregano
  

• 2 cups vegetable stock
  

• Good ole salt and pepper
  

What You Will Need to Do

• Preheat your oven to 160 degrees C

• Chop capsicum into pieces that sit relatively flat on a baking tray.

• Halve your tomatoes and place face down, with capsicum, on an oiled baking tray.

• Drizzle with oil, minced garlic, fennel seeds, dried oregano and salt and pepper.

• Place in oven, set timer for at least 45 minutes.

• If you have extra time, my suggestion is the longer the better!

Your veggies should look something like this going into the oven (if you mood lit them, like I apparently did) :

And something like this coming out:


Mmmm, wrinkly.

• About ten or fifteen minutes before the tomato and capsicum is done, cube the potato and fry in a soup pot, with a little bit of salt, pepper, paprika, and olive oil.

• When potato is tender add tomato paste, and fry for a further minute.

• Add the fresh parsley, roasted tomato and capsicum, stir together.

• Add stock and bring to the boil.

• Blend it to hell with a bamix, or until smooth.

• Salt and pepper to taste.
  

You soup should look something like this before you blend it:

And something like this, after:

Speaking of things from the '90s that make me happy (dinosaurs on the big screen, mostly!) if you've been meaning to get into Pavement, now is the time:

We Dance - from Wowee Zowee
Embassy Row - from Brighten the Corners
Billie - from Terror Twilight

Soup Week 2009

Hello readers, and welcome to the first ever A Whistle and A Milkshake Soup Week! Tara and I are looking forward to bringing you a week of warm liquid goodness, with lots of delicious soup recipes to see you through the next few chilly months.

My lovely fellow blog-mistress and I decided to have a crack at Soup Week 09 on the back of a long e-mail conversation that revolved around soup, in many tasty incarnations. I've had soup on the brain these last few weeks, and in my tummy too. It is perhaps the ultimate comfort food, it banishes that freezing wintry feeling and warms the kitchen while it boils on the stove. I can't think of a more comforting meal than a big bowl of something warm with a buttery bread roll on the side. Mmmmm... soup. We hope you enjoy! 

PS. We will never, ever serve up 'Cream of Beefaroni'. We will always love Natalie Dee.