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Veg stoo virgin

incorporating Recipes and Cooking
bungeejumper
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Veg stoo virgin

#299311

Postby bungeejumper » April 9th, 2020, 1:56 pm

Okay, so I here I am, looking uncertainly at the contents of my veg box, some of which I've never even attempted to cook before. But, having been brought up with post-war food shortages, I feel it incumbent upon me now to waste nothing. Looks like some sort of veg casserole or stew, then.

Mid sized turnip, half-a-coconut-sized celeriac, leeks, several parsnips (which my wife doesn't really like TBH), sweet potato (huge), carrots, kale, cauliflower, any number of mid-sized spuds (red and white). Plus ad-lib canned tomatoes, mushrooms, herbs and paprika, of which I have industrial quantities in the cupboard.

Not a clue how to do this, or which things (if any) would need pre-cooking. Anybody got a (truly) foolproof method?

BJ

UncleEbenezer
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Re: Veg stoo virgin

#299323

Postby UncleEbenezer » April 9th, 2020, 2:22 pm

That's an awful lot of veg.

And they're all Good Stuff for a nourishing winter soup or broth. The base recipe for that is to start by frying up tasty stuff - typically lots of onion, garlic, chilli, ginger[1] - then add chopped veg, stock and water and simmer for however long the underlying veg calls for.

Can be liquidised for a thick and nourishing creamed soup. Whether liquidised or not, it can be served as-is or on pasta, and is often enhanced by things on top like fresh herbs, sour cream or similar.

You can add protein and make it a main meal: lentils (red ones if for liquidising), chickpeas, or your choice of pulses (some may affect cooking times). Or if liquidising it, tofu will take on the flavour and consistency of all that's in there. Lentils can also be made a main flavour (think, as in a dhal).

Great advantage: you can brew up a huge cauldron, then freeze whatever you don't eat.

[1] Once you have the basics, you can play with much more subtle flavours. Especially when your base ingredient is something as delicious as, say, parsnips.

bungeejumper
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Re: Veg stoo virgin

#299324

Postby bungeejumper » April 9th, 2020, 2:29 pm

Cheers, E. Yes, I'm thinking of a quadruple quantity for freezing.

So you do the whole thing in the pan, rather than casseroling? We do have a vast enamel casserole, probably two gallons capacity! But maybe I'd be better off cutting my teeth (so to speak) on pan cooking until I've got a better.n idea about how long stuff takes to cook?

Which items, in your estimation, tend to take the longest? (The turnip, I imagine?)

Thanks again :)

BJ

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Re: Veg stoo virgin

#299326

Postby Midsmartin » April 9th, 2020, 2:40 pm

Parsnips are best roast/baked. Sometimes I do a mix of potato, carrot and parsnips wedges, baked in the oven on a tray coated with a bit of oil and a selection of salt/pepper/spices.

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Re: Veg stoo virgin

#299338

Postby ReformedCharacter » April 9th, 2020, 3:00 pm

Parsnip soup is good, perhaps with a little cumin. Celeriac goes well if mashed with potato. Heaven know what to do with a Turnip apart from keeping it until Halloween.

RC

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Re: Veg stoo virgin

#299344

Postby bungeejumper » April 9th, 2020, 3:14 pm

ReformedCharacter wrote:Heaven know what to do with a Turnip apart from keeping it until Halloween.

Ah, but that's what I grow pumpkins for. :D The ones that don't get carved are turned into soup, which my wife freezes in small batches so that they can sit there, forgotten, until next autumn. (Anybody fancy some pumpkin soup?)

BJ

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Re: Veg stoo virgin

#299350

Postby Dod101 » April 9th, 2020, 3:41 pm

ReformedCharacter wrote:Parsnip soup is good, perhaps with a little cumin. Celeriac goes well if mashed with potato. Heaven know what to do with a Turnip apart from keeping it until Halloween.

RC


Turnip? Well you could try to find a haggis..........But it can go into a soup as well as anything else. I should think it is quite nourishing as well.

Dod

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Re: Veg stoo virgin

#299354

Postby swill453 » April 9th, 2020, 3:55 pm

Dod101 wrote:Turnip? Well you could try to find a haggis

If it's really a turnip then it's got no business being anywhere near haggis.

A swede on the other hand...

(Yes I know "neep" is probably derived from "turnip". Doesn't make it one though.)

Scott.

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Re: Veg stoo virgin

#299357

Postby Dod101 » April 9th, 2020, 3:59 pm

swill453 wrote:
Dod101 wrote:Turnip? Well you could try to find a haggis

If it's really a turnip then it's got no business being anywhere near haggis.

A swede on the other hand...

(Yes I know "neep" is probably derived from "turnip". Doesn't make it one though.)

Scott.


Indeed. My mistake. We never have turnips as in white fleshed neeps. I was thinking of the swede all the time.

Dod

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Re: Veg stoo virgin

#299359

Postby bungeejumper » April 9th, 2020, 4:01 pm

Dod101 wrote:Turnip? Well you could try to find a haggis..........But it can go into a soup as well as anything else. I should think it is quite nourishing as well.

Late news. It's a swede. :( I always did hate swede, which they force-fed us with when I was at school. Nasty stuff, boiled to death with a sort of rancid tobacco smell that made you choke. Think it would serve me better as an offensive weapon, to be honest.

Okay, that's one less ingredient. (Or do I mean fewer?) Life is getting simpler. :D

BJ

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Re: Veg stoo virgin

#299396

Postby UncleEbenezer » April 9th, 2020, 6:49 pm

ReformedCharacter wrote:Parsnip soup is good, perhaps with a little cumin. Celeriac goes well if mashed with potato. Heaven know what to do with a Turnip apart from keeping it until Halloween.

RC

Magic ingredient with parsnips: grate (or pestle-and-mortar) a nutmeg into it. Brings out the flavour nicely.

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Re: Veg stoo virgin

#299398

Postby UncleEbenezer » April 9th, 2020, 6:59 pm

bungeejumper wrote:
Dod101 wrote:Turnip? Well you could try to find a haggis..........But it can go into a soup as well as anything else. I should think it is quite nourishing as well.

Late news. It's a swede. :( I always did hate swede, which they force-fed us with when I was at school. Nasty stuff, boiled to death with a sort of rancid tobacco smell that made you choke. Think it would serve me better as an offensive weapon, to be honest.
BJ

If you do brew up an everything-soup/broth, swede goes nicely in it.

I'll make at least one such soup each winter from a supermarket bag of mixed root veg, including a small swede (more carrots than any other single ingredient). A good balanced can't-go-wrong mix - except in that they typically include a token but inadequate onion.

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Re: Veg stoo virgin

#299400

Postby kempiejon » April 9th, 2020, 7:04 pm

The football sized purple skinned yellow fleshed thing I first came across whilst travelling round Ireland in a van where a sackful cost a couple of punts so it was a staple of many a meal.
The Irish call them turnips, and some Scots abbreviate that to neeps, the English call them swedes and the Americans call them rutabaga the Swedes I'm not sure.
You can make acceptable chips out of them.

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Re: Veg stoo virgin

#299420

Postby Dod101 » April 9th, 2020, 8:09 pm

Since it is a swede, just find a haggis and you are made. You have plenty of potatoes you say.

After and probably during WW2 my father like many people turned most of his garden into a vegetable plot and one of the many things he grew were swedes and they became a staple in our diet. They are maybe an acquired taste but I prefer them to this day to the white turnip and they certainly do well in soup but also as a vegetable with meat, mashed, helped along with pepper.

Dod

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Re: Veg stoo virgin

#299435

Postby UncleEbenezer » April 9th, 2020, 8:57 pm

bungeejumper wrote:Cheers, E. Yes, I'm thinking of a quadruple quantity for freezing.

So you do the whole thing in the pan, rather than casseroling? We do have a vast enamel casserole, probably two gallons capacity! But maybe I'd be better off cutting my teeth (so to speak) on pan cooking until I've got a better.n idea about how long stuff takes to cook?

Which items, in your estimation, tend to take the longest? (The turnip, I imagine?)

Thanks again :)

BJ


I have a huge pan that goes on the hob. Serves both for pre-frying and simmering the lot. If you use a casserole in the oven instead, you'll have to do the frying part separately.

As for how long it takes, one advantage of a soup or broth is that the texture of your individual veg doesn't matter, so simmering too long is not a problem with most veg. Any root veg can safely be cooked longer than necessary, and you can let the slowest ingredient - very likely the swede - dictate the time. Of course it's worth cutting things nice and thin to help with both cooking and flavour. Enjoy the rich cooking smell at your leisure, perhaps with the merest drop of white wine or a wee dram!

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Re: Veg stoo virgin

#299441

Postby swill453 » April 9th, 2020, 9:06 pm

UncleEbenezer wrote:Any root veg can safely be cooked longer than necessary, and you can let the slowest ingredient - very likely the swede - dictate the time. Of course it's worth cutting things nice and thin to help with both cooking and flavour.

I find carrots take the longest. I often cook carrots and swede together, and cut the carrots into smaller dice.

Scott.

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Re: Veg stoo virgin

#299733

Postby johnstevens77 » April 10th, 2020, 10:10 pm

Haggis needs" champit tatties and bashed neeps". As well a a dram of course.

john


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