Quick Potato, Onion, Celery Soup

Rainy days, cold and windy days - those are the times when a steaming hot bowl of soup seems to be just the ticket. Rainy days seem to be lingering out here on the West Coast and with it being very much an inside day, it was a good time to get a pot of soup ready for lunch.

Vegetable soups are very quick and easy and don’t necessarily need to sit for 24 hours to have the flavours fully melded.

In this recipe you can easily substitute leaks for the celery.

RECIPE:

2 medium sized potatoes - peeled and cut into smallish pieces
6 celery stocks - slice into fine slices (use the top leaves but not the bottom white of the stock)
1 medium onion chopped
3 green onions - chopped
½ lemon - juiced and outside rind saved
1 ½ McCormick’s vegetable or chicken stock cubes
1 teaspoon of dry oregano
2 teaspoon of salt- add 1 teaspoon and taste as it cooks and then add more if you would like more.
¼ teaspoon Dijon mustard
4 cups water
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon butter
Fresh thyme stems if available - don’t use dry thyme
Splash of whipping cream if desired *


- Heat butter and olive oil in your pot, turn heat down to medium and add the celery and onions. Add a little salt. Cook them together, sweat them, so they become tender but not brown. This is about 5- 7 minutes.
- Squeeze the lemon juice in and then also throw in the lemon piece to the pot.
- Add the chopped potatoes, gently mix together and then add the water and stock cubes and bring to a boil then let it continue boiling on a medium heat for about 20 minutes.
- Add oregano.
- If you have fresh thyme put it in too.
- Check for the taste of the broth to see if you want to add more salt or not.
- Once the potatoes are very soft add the Dijon mustard.
- Remove soup from the heat and let it cool a little. Remove the piece of lemon. Remove thyme stems.

- if you want it to be a cream soup, add a ¼ cup of whipping cream to the soup and bring it to the boil again.*

- Using either a hand blender or a regular blender, puree the soup. Again check your seasoning to make sure it is to your liking. Add more salt if you need to.


If you want to jazz it up, toast little slices of a baguette and then grill a little Gruyere cheese on them to make little cheese croutons. You can also drizzle a touch of Truffle oil on the top of your soup.