Healthy hearty soup and sides

We've got a lovely soup today to warm your heart during this stormy weather at the moment. Something easy and quick as a snack or as the starter to your New Years dinner.

Prep time: 10 minutes

Cooking time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

1 Sweet potato

3 potatoes

5 medium sized carrots

2 white onions

4 cloves of garlic

2 stalks of celery

2 leeks

Rosemary, Thyme and Sage salt

White pepper

Butter

Olive Oil

Vegetable Boulion

2 Bay leaves

350g of lardons or diced rashers

parsely

baggette

Method:

Wash and chop all the vegetables. Cut all the vegetables into mouthful sized pieces and peel all of the potatoes.

Pop olive oil into your pot with your onion and 3 cloves of garlic at a medium heat.

Once those have browned, drop in the celery, carrots, and potatoes allowing to brown also.

Cover the vegetbles with hot water.

At this point we add generous pinches of our rosemary, thyme and sage salt, white pepper, bay leaves and boullion

allowing it al to simmer for 25 minutes.

For our lardons and leeks topped baggette,

We soak the lardons in hot water for three to four minutes, releasing a lot the salt in them. Drain the water.

Add butter to a hot pan, throw in the lardons and fry until crispy.

Then put in your leek and another clove of garlic to the pan and fry on a high heat until the are browned but look like they still have some bite to them. Season with salt and pepper.

By this time the soup should have finished cooking. Allow it to cool for several minutes before you blend.

Slice the baguettes into inch-thick pieces and toast with a little butter mixed with your remaining garlic and parsely in the grill until golden.

Place the leek and lardons onto the toasted baguette. Season soup to taste and serve immediately.

The cooled soup can be kept for up to two days, stored in a sealed contaner in the fridge.