soup making

[Pawty]

Nothing like making your own bread. Lazy Saturday's involve making a loaf and roasting a chicken (with stuffing) and having sandwiches for supper!

My husband and I differ in our bread making technique.

Me - chuck all the ingredients in the magi mix - leave for a couple of hours, kneed, stick on a tray, in the oven for 30 minutes and see what shape you get.

Him - chuck the ingredients in the magi mix, put in a bowl, leave in a warm place for a long time. Lovingly kneed and place in a wooden bread basket, pre heat Dutch oven, tip dough into Dutch oven and bake for 30 min (at 230') then take top off and bake for another 15 min. You get a beautiful round loaf with perfect circle pattern (looks like an artisan sour dough) with a lovely crust.

Ultimately - they cost the same. But his do taste better......

We also make a lot of soup - whalers in the fridge or available at the lotty. A favourite is using the gammon stock, with barley, kale, carrot and leek.

[Ricard with an H]

Where I live we have lots of unemployed and a measure of don't want employment. Mostly though it's people living on minimum wage with minimum hours so those who try sometimes have two or three jobs just to keep the wolf from the door.

I go to Hampshire/ Berkshire often and whilst I accept people who are sensible will be sensible about how they spend their money I don't see a lot of sensible amongst those who need-most to be sensible around these parts.

I'm comparing the two areas, our area needs more skilled soup makers that make their own bread but I'm guessing the H And B area that can afford more actually have the better soup and bread makers.

Anyone can make a different soup for everyday of the week, soup is easy to digest, tasty, cheap, nutritional and along with home made bread made by your husband (Smile) an absolute treat.

I'm living amongst a lot of apathy that complains about having to eat beans on toast and make soup but insist on an iPhone.

Thanks for the opportunity to rant.

[Westi]

Hi Richard!

Funny you mention soup & bread makers, had a rant over the back fence with the neighbour today about the number of machines we have taking up cupboard space! In my house I am not the culprit, Mr Westi is conned by every new gadget that comes on the market, although I did win the battle over the benefit of a NutriBullet & soup maker! We have a big magi-mix, mini-magi mix, big liquidiser, stick liquidiser, 2 coffee/spice grinders, toaster, toasted sandwich press, juicer, mixer, boiled egg maker (actually that's pretty good) and a coffee maker & cappuccino maker.

Get the drift? I use the griller, the oven, the stick blender, those toaster bag things, kettle & the hob mostly. The boiled egg thing as mentioned is grand (£12.99 at Lidl). The juicer is invaluable, but only used in the right season for allotment fruit & veg not bought stuff. Throw the rest out? Love to but just how much money is that I'd be throwing away & you can't even donate electrical stuff & mother-in-law gets the same as gifts. In the meantime just keeping Mr Westi away from the local electrical/kitchen shop!

Westi

[robo]

We are just the same westi, but I got rid of the soupmaker I gave it to our youngest daughter I used it twice before I decided it was not for me, the sandwich toastie maker when to where I worked and never came back the first coffee machine went to our middle daughter the rest are sitting on shelves in the garage, here in Spain we are on solar power very few electrical gadgets to think about, if we want do some washing we have to start one of the generators life is so much more uncomplicated here , back home on Tuesday will have to get the bread maker going then the microwave then the three mixers that's all after the kettle and the coffeemaker

[Ricard with an H]

I suppose we have a few gadgets but it isn't me who buys them and our gadgets are mostly basic machines like a big bowl mixer, a multi type Magimix hand mixers and a stick blender. They all get used.

The bread machine sat unused for years but it's now used at least twice a week I find that the bread mixer makes very good dough that is well-mixed with the gluten nicely formed, it's to do with the asymmetric paddle. I never bake bread in the machine, I hand shape and form the dough, wet it with milk, sprinkle with seeds after slashing it then it goes in the oven. I only use bread forms for sourdough and never do sourdough in the mixer, sourdough is a completely different process.

I don't understand what a soup maker does, I make soup in a pan with a lid. I usually sautee all my ingredients with herbs or spices then add boiling water. When it's ready I eat it or sometimes it gets blended first. How can I improve my process ?

Whilst I don't have many gadgets in the kitchen you could write a book about the toys I have in my cave, three different grass cutting machines, two different sized brushcutter, a hedge cutter and a chainsaw. I have workshop machines though I did get rid of some I stopped using. Hand tools for doing just about anything skilfully and there is my excuse. With the right kit and some skill you can do lots more jobs skilfully.

With most kitchen gadgets I don't see them adding to my skills in the kitchen or as a convenience.

I almost forgot, I have a £400 coffee grinder, I roast green coffee beans with a hot air gun in a large colander and brew coffee by either filtering, French-press or stove-top thingy. I did have a very expensive Italian espresso machine but I prefer filter coffee. A lot of coffee geeks get suckered into buying a coffee roaster, I'm not quite that much of a sucker. I roast coffee every week and grind my beans as I need them though fresh roasted coffee is best ground the day before because of the retained gasses in the bean.

[Pa Snip]

. In the meantime just keeping Mr Westi away from the local electrical/kitchen shop!

Westi

Mr W would have a field day at the Ideal Home Exhibition then.
If he proposes a trip to Olympia don't be fooled, he doesn't mean Greece.

He will have seen a advert for the Westi London event.

[Ricard with an H]

Ha-Haaaaa.

Mine went last year and came back with a gadget that massages your shoulders, German made and to be honest very effective though on the the pugilist side. Sort-of like being beaten by rotating golf balls captured in an over the shoulder fabric containment.

It works but it is a gadget.

[Westi]

OMG Pa! No way can he go there!

Mind it doesn't stop with kitchen gadgets. He has more hobbies than time - model trains, astronomy, bird watching, photography, fishing, cycling & every new thing to go with them too! I think the kitchen stuff is a bit of a pay off to me.

I'm covertly in discussion with the lads at his work to convince him to sell some bits, but of course he'll just buy more!

Westi

[Marigold]

Definitely the "poor relation" here and happy at that. Ah well! In the days when I baked all my own bread I had a kenwood. Happy as I am and less power bills... Now that the landlord has forgotten all about the dead washing machine I am happy with a bucket and unused sink plunger..

[Ricard with an H]

Goodness, that takes me back with a smile and though I would hate to be without a washing machine I would manage rather than not feed myself or keep warm in winter.

Marigold, your weather is probably about the same as ours here on the west coast, the weather forecast for the south east wast 1 degree this morning. Ours was 6 degrees.

I'm nervous about planting anything yet though I did sow my garlic.

[Primrose]

It's still definitely soup weather here. Looking out of the window can be very deceptive. The sun is shining brightly but the wind is bitter and I'm relieved that apart from plating some onion sets at the week-end I've not been tempted to sow anything. ham and I still have ham and chicken stock in the freezer to use up, and on days like this a bowl of hot home made soup with plenty of fibre in it and some nice crusty bread is just the right comfort food.

[Marigold]

Goodness, that takes me back with a smile and though I would hate to be without a washing machine I would manage rather than not feed myself or keep warm in winter.

Marigold, your weather is probably about the same as ours here on the west coast, the weather forecast for the south east wast 1 degree this morning. Ours was 6 degrees.

I'm nervous about planting anything yet though I did sow my garlic.[/quote There is definitely a shiver in the air today but the clarity over the mountains that surround the house is beautiful..Where eg landlords are concerned Ireland can be like a third world country and the hassle.. Here there was an ancient fridge freezer that finally died and I manipulated the landlord into a fast replacement by sourcing a second hand one locally. So he and a mate arrive with this huge thing and then they find it is wider than the space. LL announces he has a saw in the car so in he comes with a large chain saw and proceeds to demolish the worktop.,. stench of diesel was incredible and the cats fled the house.....He promised weeks ago re the washing machine but this week is St Patrick's Day so nothing would get done. If i get stuck there is an outdoor laundry I am longing to try. E8 for 18k and E2 for the drier. But today got all my washing done and dried. I am planting on windowledges..

[Ricard with an H]

Primrose, you encouraged me.

These bright and dry Spring days it's so lovely to get outside and catch up with work that needs doing, the downside is that I neglect myself. I end up working too long then I'm too tired to cook, fine when she is home at the weekends because she feeds me but in the week I even go to bed without a shower sometimes.

So, you encouraged me to plan my day around fresh baked bread and soup. I have bread in the freezer but it's never as nice as just cooled and whilst soup often tastes better on the second day I just love to have a couple of bowls of whatever I created on that day.

It's going to have cauli and kale in it, no meat. I have olives, onions, spuds and maybe some green lentils. I also have a slice of gammon but I'm fairly sure I'll hold with the meat because we had lamb at the weekend in a soup/casserole type thing. I polished that off yesterday.

So, soupmaking starts before work and bread dough is already being mixed as I type.

Woooo-hoooooo, I also have some special Spanish paprika from a nearby deli, that'll go in.

[Marigold]

Aldi keep almost giving fruit and vegetables away, reducing six to 29 cents. Irresistible.. so yesterday I cooked a kilo of baby Rooster potatoes, 29 cents, two corn cobs, 29 cents and added a few frozen peas. Yesterday I simply added cheese and melted it with butter so today I have bagged some of the potatoes and frozen them and soup may well be from the rest..... A chilly day just now so that sounds great.... or a variation on potato salad...I am not growing much this year as a serious relocation may happen. Just peas and broad beans really. Adli and LIDL do wonders in reducing cost of food..So I think soup!

[Ricard with an H]

Mine is done Marigold, and the bread is just out of the oven.

I'm mostly cooking for one because I'm a bachelor five days. Sort of a 5/2 matrimonial diet. Cooking for one can easily end up boring or you throw stuff ans many creations are difficult to create for just one if you're not a chef.

Last week I made soup and made a portion of dumplings twice as much as I could eat so I put half the dumplings in the fridge for the next day. It doesn't work, they were hard and uninviting.

Even frozen and defrosted bread is never as good as fresh.