Parenthetical

(The idea of posting these “recipes” is to give an idea of my thought process as I cook. Some of you seem interested when you’re in my kitchen watching, so maybe you’ll be interested if I write about it? It amuses me, anyway. If I were less lazy and a better photographer, I’d take pictures.)

The leeks were the start of this, because there were lots of them and they were lurking in my crisper, getting brown and wrinkly. Fortunately if you peel off the outer layer, they’re just fine. Chop ‘em up, leave ‘em in a bowl of water to sift the dirt out.

The standard thing to put in this is potatoes, but standard is boring. The red potatoes do need to get used up, though — they’re sending up alien tentacles and getting soft (though that doesn’t matter because I’m boiling them anyway); red potatoes aren’t so good for storage, it turns out. Wash and chop about 6 small ones. Note to self: come up with more ways to use red potatoes in the very near future.

That monster celeriac would free up a lot of space in my fridge, and add a nice clean taste to the soup. In it goes, along with 3 apples I got from the school Dining Center today. They’re local, but too mushy for eating raw and too small to cut up large-scale for baking, so I got sent home with a huge bag. (Uh, anyone feel like making applesauce this weekend?)

Oh, and there’s a beet. A very tiny wrinkly beet that I was going to throw in the compost, except why not add it? It’s still jewel-red on the inside.

Saute the leeks and then everything else in a couple of tablespoons of butter, then add 5 cups of water (enough so the chunks are not quite covered) and simmer about 20 minutes, until the veggies are soft.

Now to make it taste like something. Salt, and… I’d originally been thinking rosemary, but that’ll be weird with the celeriac. End up deciding on a couple of big globs of the local sweet brown rice miso, because I’m obsessed with it. Oddly, it’s really good. If I were less lazy/hungry, I’d puree it now, but instead I’m just going to eat it. With a dollop of sour cream on top, because I happen to have some (though in retrospect maybe not next time with the miso).

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