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Friday 21 August 2020

Celeriac and Apple Soup with Bacon and Parsley


With Storm Ellen bringing very strong winds and heavy rain to parts of the UK and Ireland through Wednesday night, and with further wind warnings in place yesterday (Thursday) and again today (Friday), my thoughts turned to soup! Well, why not ...

This recipe suggestion is from 'The Hairy Bikers'. The Hairy Bikers are "David Myers and Simon King, two northern blokes with a passion for cooking and food."

Eating apples give a sweet note to this root vegetable soup, which is topped with crisp pieces of bacon and crème fraîche.


Ingredients
Serves Six
500g/1lb 2oz (roughly 3) eating apples
50g/1¾oz butter
1 tbsp sunflower oil
2 onions, chopped
1 celeriac (roughly 750g/1lb 10oz), cut into roughly 2cm/¾in chunks
1 large carrot (roughly 120g/4½oz), cut into roughly 1.5cm/½in slices
2 garlic cloves, crushed
2 medium potatoes (roughly 250g/9oz), peeled and cut into roughly 2cm/¾in chunks
1 small bunch fresh thyme (3-4 sprigs)
1 bay leaf
1.3 litres/2¼ pints vegetable or chicken stock, made with 1 stock cube
flaked sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
For the garnish
1 tsp sunflower oil
4 rashers rindless smoked streaky bacon
4 tbsp crème fraîche
2 tbsp milk
small handful flat leaf parsley, leaves roughly torn
Method
1. Peel the apples, cut them into quarters and remove the cores. Cut the apples into thick slices. Melt 25g/1oz of the butter in a large saucepan and fry the apple pieces over a medium heat for five minutes, or until lightly browned, turning regularly. Using a slotted spoon, transfer the apple pieces to a plate and return the pan to the heat.
2. Add the remaining butter and oil to the pan and as soon as the butter melts, gently fry the onions, celeriac and carrot for 15 minutes, or until the onions are softened and very lightly browned, stirring occasionally. Add the garlic, apples, potatoes, thyme and bay leaf and cook for three minutes more, stirring.
3. Pour the stock into the pan, season with black pepper and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat to a simmer and cook for about 25 minutes, or until the celeriac and carrots are very soft, stirring occasionally.
4. Remove the pan from the heat. Remove the thyme stalks and bay leaf and discard. Cool slightly and then blend the soup with a stick blender until very smooth. (For an even more velvety soup, pass it through a fine sieve into a clean bowl.) Add a little extra water if necessary until the right consistency is reached. Alternatively, allow the soup to cool for a while and then blend in a food processor until smooth and return to the pan.
5. Adjust the seasoning with salt and pepper to taste. Set aside until ready to serve.
6. To make the garnish, brush the oil over the inside of a small non-stick frying pan and fry the bacon for 2-3 minutes on each side over a medium-high heat until browned and crisp. Drain on kitchen paper.
7. Mix the crème fraîche with the milk in a small bowl until smooth.
8. Reheat the soup gently just before serving, stirring constantly. Ladle into warmed bowls.
9. Drizzle the crème fraîche mixture into each bowl of soup. Carefully snip the crisp bacon into pieces with kitchen scissors and scatter on top. Sprinkle with the parsley, season with a little freshly ground black pepper and serve.

Tip
Use six tablespoons soured cream instead of the crème fraîche and milk mixture if you prefer.
From original idea here
You may also like this Cream of Celeriac Soup recipe, see more details here

Dear reader, you will find a variety of recipe suggestions within this blog, and 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

33 comments:

Tom said...

...what a great mix!

eileeninmd said...

Hello,
Sounds delicious! I hope you are safe from the storm!
Enjoy your day, happy weekend!

Jo said...

That's an unusual recipe. Yes, soup will definitely be on the menu again, it's so windy here today, but still very warm.

Valerie-Jael said...

This is a soup I love, but I will only start cooking again when the temperatures drop. Valerie

Fun60 said...

It sounds delicious. A perfect soup for that kind of inbetween weather.

DVArtist said...

Ohhhh this sounds so interesting. I will give this a try.

Christine said...

Looks so good!

Sue said...

Well this sounds different, but you never know until you try! xx

Elephant's Child said...

You have reminded me (again) that I really need to experiment more with celeriac. Thank you.

Margarida Pires said...

Olá Eddie!
Algo inovador para mim!
Parece óptima!
Um abraço recheado de gratidão!🌼🌻🌼
Megy Maia🌈

Victor S E Moubarak said...

We should try celeriac ... again.

God bless.

aussie aNNie said...

Looks rather yum. Different but nice x

peppylady (Dora) said...

Apples are a good thing in soups

Karen @ Beatrice Euphemie said...

Looks and sounds delicious! Perfect for a stormy day. Hope you stay safe in the storm! x Karen

Margaret D said...

Now that would be yummy.

Iris Flavia said...

Hmmmm, another one that goes into my list!
Hot here, no wind, not a breeze. River Oker turns our home into a sauna. No Mil... soup today! ;-)

mamasmercantile said...

Sounds delicious, I love Autumnal soups, they are so comforting. Sadly I also enjoy the bread that goes along with it and need to resist.

baili said...

Absolutely compelling dear Jan

I love soups specially we make often in winters
Sending best wishes for you and your family my friend!

Lady Fi said...

I love a good soup when it is chilly outside.

Jeanie said...

What a really nice combination of flavors. This sounds very good. And it's just about apple season!

Luiz Gomes said...

Boa tarde parabéns pelas receitas.

My name is Erika. said...

And recipe I printed out. This sounds wonderful for fall.

Bill said...

That looks delicious!

David M. Gascoigne, said...

As far as I can recall I have never used celeriac, but this soup seems like a good reason to give it a try. I rarely met a vegetable I didn't like. We have even taken to making our Cesar salad with kale sometimes, instead of romaine lettuce.

Debbie said...

this looks so good, nice ingredients that we would enjoy in a soup!!

Rose said...

This sounds so good...

sheila 77 said...

We're always on the lookout for soup recipes and this is great timing as the apples are becoming ready on the trees. I've never made soup with apples so this will be a first, thanks!

Mary Kirkland said...

That sounds so good.

Marco Luijken said...

Hello Jan,
That looks very delicious.
I think this soup will taste great with those ingredients. Lovely!!

Greetings, Marco

Carla from The River said...

I am pinning this one too!! Thank you for sharing. Yum!!

carol l mckenna said...

Yum ~ soup! Coming into that season soon ^_^ Time for soup ^_^

Live each moment with love,

A ShutterBug Explores,
aka (A Creative Harbor)

Anne (cornucopia) said...

Soup is good during stormy weather. I hope you fared okay during the storm. I haven't been reading the news the past few weeks, so I didn't realize you guys had severe weather come through. As you saw on my blog, it took me almost 3 weeks to do the storm clean up here in Connecticut US, but at least it's done. Now I need to let my muscles recover.

Teresa said...

Una muy buena receta. Un beso.