Which soup maker?

[Steve Maskery]

The best soup I've had in years is a recipe given to me by Modernist, late of this parish (I don't mean he's dead, he's just not around much!). It was his granny's and is quite delicious. I'm sure he won't mind me sharing it.

It makes 18 portions, so you might want to scale it down a bit if you don't have much freezer space.

100g bacon or preferably pancetta lardons
4 onions
4 cloves garlic
750g red lentils
6 medium carrots
1 small takeaway container of frozen chicken stock or 2 stock cubes.

Fry the lardons in a splash of olive oil in the stockpot with the garlic until browning for flavour. Add the onions and fry until soft. Add the lentils and stir to coat with oil.
Add a good measure of ground black peppercorns ( guess 20-30)
Fill with 10 pints of water and the stock.
Grate and add the carrot
Bring to the boil and simmer for 90 mins.
In addition I added a bit of Worcestershire sauce and some Tabasco.

Whizz up and serve with a dollop of sour cream and chives.
Absolutely fantastic.

(Classic cuisine would suggest that it should have a stick of celery in the soffrito, so I might try that next time. But it was certainly delicious just as it was.)

 

[DennisCA]

^^^^
Sounds interesting, will make that some time.

A stainless steel pot is a soup maker in my world.

Now a classic soup recipe would be sometihng like
-600-800 grams of beef or oxtails.
-Potatoes
-Carrots
-Leeks
-Parsnips
-Celeriac (not a lot)

Season with salt, black pepper, allspice, bay leaves.

Boil water and add the ingredients. if you like you can brown it a bit first, I always do. Skim off the foam while it cooks. Let it cook for 1.5-2 hours, then remove the meat, chop it it into pieces, return to pot. Some people strain the broth too but to me it just looks fake with too clear broth.

A popular addition to soup are "lumps" (klimpar) basically flour dumplings.
2 eggs
200 ml milk
500 ml flour
2 tsp salt
1 tsk sugar

Mix into a batter, take a table spoon of said goop and throw into the soup as it's nearing completion. You can also boil it in a separate container and add later if you are one of those who want clear broth. But I think it's best to boil it in the broth with the soup, most flavour that way.

is that a traditional Finnish soup?

how long would you put the dumplings for?

Pretty standard nordic soup I would say, I'd probably heave them in the last 10 minutes of cooking perhaps. This is a main course meal here, usually made in big enough quantities to last more than one day. Goes great with crisp bread (knäckebröd).

 

[Woodchips2]

The best soup I've had in years is a recipe given to me by Modernist, late of this parish (I don't mean he's dead, he's just not around much!). It was his granny's and is quite delicious. I'm sure he won't mind me sharing it.

It makes 18 portions, so you might want to scale it down a bit if you don't have much freezer space.

100g bacon or preferably pancetta lardons
4 onions
4 cloves garlic
750g red lentils
6 medium carrots
1 small takeaway container of frozen chicken stock or 2 stock cubes.

Fry the lardons in a splash of olive oil in the stockpot with the garlic until browning for flavour. Add the onions and fry until soft. Add the lentils and stir to coat with oil.
Add a good measure of ground black peppercorns ( guess 20-30)
Fill with 10 pints of water and the stock.
Grate and add the carrot
Bring to the boil and simmer for 90 mins.
In addition I added a bit of Worcestershire sauce and some Tabasco.

Whizz up and serve with a dollop of sour cream and chives.
Absolutely fantastic.

(Classic cuisine would suggest that it should have a stick of celery in the soffrito, so I might try that next time. But it was certainly delicious just as it was.)

I'm going to try this Steve but is the 90 mins simmer correct?
Regards Keith

 

[Steve Maskery]

It what it said in the original instructions, yes.

 

[Woodchips2]

Thanks Steve. Maybe the long simmer is to develop the flavour.
Regards Keith

 

[Steve Maskery]

This thread inspired me to make it again. I gave some to my mate Charlie and he has texted me to say "Faaaaaaab soup Steve!"