Carrot, Fennel, Chob and Rocket Soup

As the UK (and much of the rest of Europe and Spain) experiences a Scandinavian-style winter, Barcelona is having a British winter: rainy, overcast with the fleeting respite of a couple of sunny days, now and again. So, lots of cups of teas and hearty soups to shake off that all too familiar bone-chilling, depressing dampness!

With a pressure cooker, who needs ready meals or take-aways? Soups are so. wonderfully. simple. Roughly chopped onions fried for a bit, roughly chopped whatever you want to chuck in, a good pinch of salt, herbs or spices to season and water - as much as you fancy - transparent and brothy or chunky and stew-like. It goes without saying that fresher ingredients are better, but soups don´t suffer greatly from throwing in whatever non-descript left-overs you find gazing forlornly out of the fridge at you.

So, here I chopped up and finished off an older bunch of carrots, a cauliflower chob (what´s left after you cut of the florets!), some fennel stems (the bulbs are too fresh and crunchy to be pulped to death now!) and what was left of a packet of rocket - lush! 5-10 minutes in a high pressure sauna, a quick whizz with a hand blender, fennel fronds piled on top, homemade bread crusts chopped into croutons and yum yum - rain? what rain!

I´ll never buy a packet or tinned vegetable soup again - it´s a crime against the palate!

Coolcumber and Salmorejo Summer Soups

Two culinary revelations with style and simplicity to cool off the heatwave:

Algerian Cucumber Soup
(converts even the no-cucumber people!)
1 cucumber
4 pots of natural yoghurt (bio if you like)
1 tooth of garlic (looks more like a claw to me!)
salt, pepper
shake of any red powdered spice combo of your liking,
I used Moroccan Baharat

chop and liquidize, taste, swirl, taste, leave to chill out for a few hours in the fridge,
add iced water or cubes to texture as desired
shake over some red powder or flakes for effect

thanks to Andres "El Uruguaxo"

Cordoban Salmorejo
Lots of juicy reddy ripe tomatoes, a kilo or more
1/2 loaf Country-style bread, if it´s dry, soak it
1/2 cup Olive oil
1/4 cup Vinegar
salt, pepper
1 clove of garlic
a raw egg, or for the more careful, hardboiled and chopped

chop and liquidize, taste add taste again, leave to cool off for a few hours in the fridge
sprinkle with chopped bits of what you like!

thanks to Diego "El Cordobaño"