Italian-style courgette/zucchini and parmesan soup

Many of us at this time of year may have a glut of courgettes/zucchini. This is a super recipe idea to help use them up in a most delicious way. The creamy soup covers tender, diced pieces of courgette that add a contrasting texture.

Ingredients:

Serves Four
60ml/2fl oz. extra virgin olive oil
1 tbsp. chopped garlic
handful basil leaves (preferably Italian), chopped
sea salt and ground white pepper, to taste
1kg/2¼lb green courgettes / zucchini, cut lengthways into quarters then into 1cm/½in slices
750ml/1¼ pint chicken stock
60ml/2fl oz. single cream
handful flat-leaf parsley, chopped
50g/2oz freshly grated Parmesan, plus extra to serve

To serve - optional:

low carb seedy bread

Green salad

salt and freshly ground black pepper

Method:

1. Heat the oil in a heavy-based pan over a medium heat.
2. Cook the garlic, basil, salt and courgette/zucchini slowly for 10 minutes, or until the courgettes are lightly browned and softened.

3. Add white pepper, to taste, then pour in the stock and simmer for 8 minutes, uncovered. Remove from the heat.

4. Put three-quarters of the soup mixture into a food processor and blend until smooth.

5. Return the mixture to the pan and stir in the cream, parsley and parmesan.

6. To serve, ladle the soup into a bowl and season, to taste, with salt and freshly ground black pepper. Sprinkle over more parmesan, to taste.

7. Optional - serve with low carb seedy bread and a green salad.

From a recipe idea here

Courgettes/zucchini are usually cheap, tasty, quick-growing and endlessly versatile, courgettes make a decent meal of any store-cupboard ingredient. They can be dressed up in a creamy lemon sauce and served with pasta, grated and added to a quiche, or served as crisp fritters. In fact, recipes for courgettes come in as many shapes and sizes as the squash itself: varieties of this summer vegetable can range from small and flying-saucer shaped, to dark-green and tennis ball-sized, to long and yellow. Give courgettes a go: remember, the smaller they are, the more flavour - if you don't pick them early enough they grow into marrows.

The perfect courgette is no fatter than your middle finger, with a wide-open yellow flower still clinging to its stem. Look for small, firm, unblemished courgettes whose skin has a healthy glow.

Dark green courgettes are easily available in Britain. Larger, pale green courgettes streaked with cream, a common sight during the summer in Italy and southern France, are starting to appear in UK farmers' markets. Round courgettes, which are sometimes imported from France, can also be grown successfully in Britain. Spaghetti squash, a rather bland-tasting vegetable whose flesh comes away in long, skinny strands when roasted, can sometimes be found in supermarkets.

Courgettes will keep in the fridge for weeks, but taste best when used as quickly as possible after picking or buying.

Courgettes can be poached, blanched, hollowed out and stuffed, baked, fried, steamed or stewed, and taste great combined with goats' cheese or garden herbs. They are quite watery vegetables so need to be cooked with care. If stuffing courgettes, pre-cook them for a few minutes in salted water before baking with their filling. Try courgettes preserved in vinegar, made into fritters or stirred into risotto. If you’ve grown your own, you can make good use of the delicate flowers too: remove their stamens, dip the flowers in tempura-style batter and deep-fry, or stuff with ricotta, parmesan and herbs and bake. They can also be sliced and added to salads, soups or risotto.

A variety of articles and recipe ideas are within this blog. Please note, not all may be suitable for you.

If you may have any food allergies, or underlying health issues these must always be taken into account. If you are a diabetic and not sure how certain foods may affect your blood sugars, test is best, i.e. use your meter.

All the best Jan