If like me you’re trying to supersize your plant portions, this soup boasts at least 10 different plants, headed up by the powerhouse of all veggies – broccoli.
This is a quick to prepare soup, where the addition of the stilton rounds out the flavours giving a lovely warming soup to which you can add a host of vegetables. Looking to up the phytonutrient content, I served it with a topping of toasted, roughly chopped hazelnuts and almonds – preferably un-blanched as much of the phytonutrient content of the nuts is found in the skin.
Serves 4-6
All you need:
- 2 medium heads of broccoli
- 1 medium potato
- 1 ‘potato sized’ piece of swede (or a second potato)
- 2 sticks celery
- 1 carrot
- 1 large onion
- 2-3 cloves garlic
- olive oil
- Salt and pepper
- 750ml vegetable stock or chicken broth
- 150g stilton
For the topping:
- A small handful of hazelnuts and almonds
All you do:
- Finely slice the onion and fry in the base of a large saucepan in a good glug of olive oil until the onion has softened and is translucent
- Add the celery and carrot, both chopped into small cubes/slices (about 1/2cm), and fry for an additional 5-10 minutes. Add the finely chopped/minced garlic and fry for a further 2 minutes
- Add the finely cubed (about 1/2 cm) potato and swede, and fry for a further 5-10 minutes.
- Chop the heads off the broccoli and chop the stalks into 1/2-1cm dice. Add the stalks to the saucepan.
- Add 750ml of vegetable stock or chicken stock and bring to a simmer. Simmer for 10 minutes until the potato and swede are tender (this may take a little longer depending on the size of your dice
- Place the broccoli florets into the other ingredients (It’s fine if they are just sitting on top of the soup), and with the lid of the saucepan on, cook/steam for 5 minutes until they are just tender. Don’t overcook the broccoli or you will lose some of the vibrant green colour
- Season to taste – remember you will be adding a salty cheese. Blend until smooth and add most of the crumbled stilton (keeping some back to serve) and blend. Check the seasoning.
- For the topping – toast the hazelnuts and almonds in a hot oven for 8-10 minutes until just toasted/taking on some colour. Chop roughly and crumble the remaining stilton.
- Serve the soup piping hot with a topping of crumbled stilton and toasted nuts